“Brain bypass, eh?”
“I’ve seen a few people with those …”
“So we ride it into town?”
“How else are we going to move all this explosive?”
They couldn’t pass up the chance. Niner had plans for the charges, places to lay them all around the Imbraani countryside. They also had a temptingly neat window of opportunity to take out the ground station at Teklet, and rendering Hokan’s troops deaf to what was happening around them would double their chances of pulling off the mission. It meant they could use their own long-range comlinks at last.
“Tell you what,” Niner said. “I’ll take this one to Teklet. You hotwire another and take Fi and our friend as far back down the road to Imbraani as you can get with as much as you can carry.” He took out his datapad and checked the chart. “Lay up here where Jinart suggested, with the droid if you can, without it if you can’t.”
A bulldozer droid on a steady path to the screening plant would attract no attention. It just had to overshoot by a few kilometers. It would be dusk soon, and darkness was their best asset when it came to moving around.
Niner hauled Guta-Nay out of the building. “Is the ground station defended in any way?”
Guta-Nay had his head lowered, looking up from under his brows as if blows to the head normally accompanied questions. “Just fence to stop merlies and thieving. Only farmers around, and they scared anyway.”
“If you’re lying to me, I’ll see that you get back to Ghez Hokan alive. Okay?”
“Okay. Truth, I swear.”
Niner summoned Fi from his cover position, and they loaded two droids. One carried enough explosives to reduce the ground station to powder several times over, and the other took everything they could lay their hands on, except for some detonators and explosives to keep the blasting droid busy for a few more hours. There was no point letting the quarry’s silence advertise the fact that they had liberated some ordnance. It would spoil the whole surprise.
They loaded Guta-Nay last, bundling him into the huge bucket scoop with his arms still bound. He protested at being stuck on top of spheres of explosive.
“Don’t worry,” Atin said dismissively. “I’ve got all the dets here.” He bounced a few detonators up and down in his palm; Guta-Nay flinched. “You’ll be fine.”
“Jinart’s quite an asset,” Fi said. He took off his helmet to drink from his bottle, and Guta-Nay made an incoherent noise.
“She could be right behind us now and we’d never know. I hope they stay on our side.” Niner removed his helmet, too, and they shared the bottle before handing it to Atin for a last swig. “What’s that Weequay whining about now?”
“Dunno,” Atin said, and took his helmet off as well. He paused, bottle in hand, and they all stood and stared at Guta-Nay, loaded in the scoop of the droid like cargo.
His mouth was slightly open and his eyes were darting from one commando to the next. He was making a slight uh– uh-uh sound, as if he was trying to scream but couldn’t.
“It’s Atin’s face,” Fi said. “Don’t stand there being so ugly, man. You’re scaring him.”
Niner gave the Weequay a quick prod with his glove to shut him up.
“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Haven’t you ever seen commandos before?”
They were here.
The break that Ghez Hokan had been waiting for had come: a farmer had rushed to notify the authorities that Republic soldiers—one man, one woman, both very young—were at a house on the Imbraani-Teklet road.
Hokan studied the dripping foliage at the side of the farmhouse. The maze of footsteps in the mud and the crushed stalks were no different from those on any farm, and they were disappearing fast in the rain. Behind the ramshackle collection of sheds and stone walls, the land sloped away to the Braan River.
“It’s a mess in there, sir,” Hurati said. “One wall nearly blown out. All dead. And that was just two enemy commandos.”
“One,” Hokan said.
“One?”
“Only male clones in the front line. The other had to be a Jedi.” He turned over the body of an Umbaran with his boot and shook his head. “That wound was made by a lightsaber. I know what a lightsaber wound looks like. Two people. I wouldn’t even have that information if it hadn’t been for informants. Do I have to rely on dung-caked farmers for intelligence? Do I? Do I?”
He regretted having to shout. But it seemed necessary. “Why can’t anyone manage to call it in when they make an enemy contact? Think! Use your di’kutla heads, or I’ll show you how to recognize a lightsaber wound the hard way.” Two droids began lifting the Umbaran’s body onto a speeder. “Leave that thing where it is. Get after your comrades and find me some enemy.”
Hurati put his hand to the side of his head. “Droids have found something else in a house up the road, sir.” His expression fell blank as he listened to his comlink. “Oh. Oh.” He turned to Hokan. “I think you should see this for yourself, sir.”
Hurati didn’t strike him as an officer that would waste his time. They mounted the speeder and worked their way back up the road to another small, dilapidated hovel set among the trees. Hokan followed Hurati into the farmhouse, where a couple of droids had illuminated the rooms with spot-lamps.
For some reason he would never fathom, the first aspect of the chaos that caught his eye was the soup tureen lying on its side on the filthy floor. It was only when he turned his head that he saw the bodies!.
“Ah,” Hokan said.
Soldiers used blasters. In a pinch, they would use knives or blunt objects. But he had never known anyone in uniform, not even his ragtag militia, who used teeth. The three adults were ripped and torn as if a large carnivore had attacked them. All had crush injuries to what was left of their throats. One woman had so little intact tissue in her neck that the head was bent over at almost ninety degrees. Hokan found himself staring.
“There are others outside in the shed,” Hurati said.
Hokan had never considered himself easily disturbed, but this worried him. It was an act by something he didn’t recognize and couldn’t comprehend, beyond the scope of a sentient creature’s simple revenge. It might have been coincidence, an animal attack on someone who happened to be an informer—but he couldn’t think of any species on Qiilura that could or would bring down humans.
Hurati studied the bodies. “I didn’t think killing civilians was the Republic’s style.”
“It’s not,” Hokan said. “And commandos wouldn’t waste time on work that wouldn’t aid their effort.”
“Well, whoever killed them wasn’t motivated by robbery.”
Hurati picked up a large metal bowl from the floor, dusted it with his glove, and set it on a shelf. “This is probably our informer. I wouldn’t count on much assistance from now on. Word will get around fast.”
“You’re certain there are no blaster wounds?” It might have been simple predation. He knew in his gut that it wasn’t. But what had done this?
“None,” Hurati said.
Hokan didn’t like it at all. He beckoned Hurati to follow him and walked out briskly to summon two droids. “I want a ring around Imbraani. Pull all the droids back. I’d rather lose Teklet than risk Uthan’s project.”
“We could arrange for Doctor Uthan to be evacuated.”
“Moving her and her entourage is going to be slow and conspicuous. We’re better off defending a position than moving. I want half the droids blatantly visible at the facility and the other half around the villa—but discreetly, understand?”
There was a rattle of metal in the distance, and Hokan spun around to see droids swarming toward the riverbank.
“Have they found anything?”
Hurati pressed his hand to his head, listening to the comlink. “Two enemy sighted five klicks west of here, sir. The droids have engaged them.”