Jedi Academy Trilogy - 03 - Champions of the Force by Star Wars

Author:Star Wars
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science Fiction
Published: 2010-08-26T08:25:31+00:00

Leia squeezed until her nails bit into the smooth fabric of Ackbar's command chair on the Galactic Voyager. The battered old Dreadnaught wheeled in its orbit and set a new course. "They're calling your bluff, Admiral," she said.

"They are not responding," Ackbar agreed.

"They won't respond," Terpfen said, sullen at an auxiliary station. "They will run. If they already have the baby, there is nothing to keep them here. They won't risk a fight against a superior battleship."

Leia swallowed, knowing Terpfen was right. She wished Han could be beside her right now.

"Then we must not let them get away," Ackbar said. He had stuck close to Terpfen's side throughout the journey. During the mustering of the rescue force, Ackbar had snatched the most loyal members of his salvage crew on Reef Home City; he had gathered others from the starship construction yards in orbit. In all that time he had not once mentioned Terpfen's treachery.

Ackbar and Terpfen were having some kind of silent conflict, a wrestling of wills. Ackbar claimed he understood how the other had been manipulated. He himself had been a prisoner of the Empire, but instead of being programmed as a spy and saboteur, he had served as an unwilling liaison to Moff Tarkin. Though those times had been oppressive, Ackbar had managed to turn his close association with the cruel strategist into an advantage during Admiral Daala's attack on Calamari. Now, he claimed, it was time for Terpfen to use his misery against the Imperials as well.

As Leia watched from the bridge of the Galactic Voyager, the blunt-ended Dreadnaught ignited its sublight engines. She closed her eyes, gripped the back of Ackbar's chair, and sent out a tendril of thought with her mind to seek the presence of baby Anakin, hoping to find him or comfort him.

She sensed her baby across the vast distance of space, but could not pinpoint his location, feeling only his presence in the Force. She could make no direct contact, could not see him. Anakin could still be on Anoth, or he could be a prisoner aboard the Dreadnaught.

"Crippling strikes only. Fire all forward weapons," Ackbar said in a maddeningly calm voice. "Cause only enough damage to prevent them from entering hyperspace."

High-powered energy beams splashed against the Vendetta's heavy shields. Residual radiation glowed from the hits, showing minor damage to the Imperial ship's hull. But the Dreadnaught continued to accelerate.

"He's going between two of the planetoids," Leia said.

Terpfen leaned forward with interest, swiveling his round eyes as he concentrated. "He's trying to use the static discharges as camouflage," he said. "With so much ionization scramble we'll lose him on our sensors. Then he can escape on any heading before we find him again."

Leia breathed deeply to subdue her anxiety. They were so close--whichyou else would the Dreadnaught run, unless they already had Anakin on board? Again she tried to sense where the baby was.

The two atmosphere-swathed fragments of Anoth's primary body loomed ahead of the Dreadnaught, with only a tight channel between the lumps.

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