Star Wars_ Labyrinth of Evil Part 25

"Don't give him the satisfaction."

Anakin shot him a worrisome scowl. "Can't have me becoming too powerful, now, can we, Master?"

Before Obi-Wan could reply, twenty battle droids hurried into the room through the door behind him. Whirling, he deflected their first barrage, then fought his way to cover behind a heap of dismembered droids, where Anakin joined him. In the hope that Dooku was listening from afar, he shouted: "Whatever happens here, Dooku, your Confederacy is finished! The Republic has all of you on the run - - even your master, Sidious."

More droids appeared. To Dooku, this was nothing more than a game, Obi-Wan told himself. But if it was a demonstration of Force ability Dooku wanted, then Anakin was still more than willing to provide it. "Dooku!"

he howled.

With such force and wrath that the ceiling of the vast hall began to collapse.

42.

"Hurry, Threepio," Padme said over her shoulder. "Unless you want the Senate to be your final resting place."

The protocol droid hastened his pace. "I a.s.sure you, Mistress, I'm moving as quickly as my limbs permit. Oh, curse my metal body! I'll become entombed here!"

The broad, ornate hallways leading from the Great Rotunda were packed with Senators, their aides, staff members, and droids, many laden with armloads of doc.u.ments and data disks, and in some cases expensive gifts received from appreciative lobbyists. Blue-robed Senate Guards and helmeted clone troopers were doing their best to oversee the evacuation, but, what with the warbling sirens and flying rumors, alarm was beginning to yield to panic.

"How could this happen?" a Sull.u.s.tan was posing to the Gotal next to him.

"How?"

To all sides of her - - among Bith, Gran, Wookiees, Rodians - - Padme heard the same question being asked. How could Coruscant be invaded? She wondered, as well. But she had more to worry about than Coruscant. Where is Anakin? She reached for him in her thoughts, with her heart. I need you. Come back to me - - quickly! Grievous's strike was impeccably timed.

Many delegates who might not have been on Coruscant had come to hear Palpatine's State of the Republic address, and had remained onworld to attend the endless parties that followed. In light of the surprise attack, Palpatine's rea.s.surances seemed even more woefully premature now than when he had uttered them. And despite the fact that the Supreme Chancellor's optimistic remarks had been echoed throughout the Great Rotunda, Padme couldn't help notice that many of her peers were surrounded by cadres of bodyguards, or sporting body armor, jet packs, or other emergency escape devices. Clearly Palpatine had failed to lull everyone into complacency.

Thirteen years earlier Padme could have claimed to be one of the few dignitaries whose homeworld had succ.u.mbed to an invasion and occupation.

Targeted by the Trade Federation, Naboo had fallen to the Neimoidians; her parents and advisers were arrested and jailed. Now she was just one of thousands of Senators whose worlds had been similarly invaded and ransacked. Regardless, she refused to accept that Coruscant could fall to the Confederacy - - even with the home fleet reduced to half its former strength. Word of mouth had it that buildings in the Amba.s.sadorial Sector had been toppled, that battle droids were surging through Loijin Plaza, that midlevel skylanes overflowed with Geonosian Fanblades and droid fighters...

Even if the rumors proved true, Padme was convinced that Palpatine would find some way to drive Grievous from the Core - - again. Perhaps he would recall battle groups partic.i.p.ating in the Outer Rim sieges. That meant that Anakin would be recalled. She chided herself for being selfish. But didn't she have the right? Hadn't she earned the right? Just this once?

Thus far, the Senate Building was unscathed. Nevertheless, Homeworld Security felt it prudent to move everyone to the shelters deep beneath the hemisphere and the enormous plaza that fronted it. With most of the autonavigation lanes congested, it wasn't as if anyone could flee Coruscant. And there was always the likelihood that Grievous would single out civilian targets, as he had done on countless occasions.

Jostled by the surging crowd, Padme collided with a Gran delegate who fixed his trio of eyestalks on her.

"And you originally opposed the Military Creation Act," he barked. "What do you say now?"

There was really no answer. Besides, she had been on the receiving end of similar reproofs since the start of the war. Typically voiced by those who failed to grasp that her concern was for the Const.i.tution, not for the ultimate fate of the free trade zones. She heard her name called, and turned to see Bail Organa and Mon Mothma angling toward where she and C-3PO were momentarily hampered. With them were two female Jedi - - Masters Shaak Ti and Sta.s.s Allie.

"Have you seen the Chancellor?" Bail asked when he could. She shook her head. "He's probably in the holding office."

"We were just there," Shaak Ti said. "The office is empty. Even his guards are gone."

"They must have escorted him to the shelters," Padme said. Bail glanced at something over her shoulder and raised his hand over his head to call attention to himself.

"Mas Amedda," he explained for Padme's benefit. "He'll know where to find the Chancellor."

The tall, horned, gray-complected Chagrian fairly shouldered his way through the crowd. "The Supreme Chancellor had no meetings scheduled until later today," he said in answer to Bail's question. "I a.s.sume he is in his residence."

"Five Hundred Republica," Shaak Ti muttered to herself in seeming frustration. "I was just there."

Amedda gazed down at her in sudden concern. "And the Chancellor wasn't?"

"I wasn't looking for him then," the Jedi started to say, then allowed her words to trail off. "Master Allie and I will check the Senate Office Building and Republica." She glanced at Padme, Bail, and the others.

"Where are you going?"

"Wherever we're directed to go," Bail said.

"The turbolifts to the shelters are overwhelmed," Sta.s.s Allie said.

"It'll be hours before the Senate is evacuated. My skimmer is at the plaza's northwest landing platform. You can pilot that directly to the shelters."

"Won't you and Shaak Ti need it?" Padme asked. "We'll use the speeder bike I arrived on," Shaak Ti said.

"We appreciate the gesture," Bail said. "But I heard that the front plaza is cordoned off."

Sta.s.s Allie took his arm. "We'll escort you."

Troopers stationed in the corridor opened a path for the group, and before long they reached the doorways to the main plaza. There, however, a commando blocked their path. "You can't exit this way," the commando told Bail.

"They're with us," Shaak Ti said. Waving signals to several of his white-armored comrades, the commando stood aside and allowed Padme's group to pa.s.s. The sky above the statue-studded plaza was crowded with guns.h.i.+ps and personnel carriers. AT-TEs and other mobile artillery pieces had already been deployed. The Jedi led Padme, C-3PO, Bail, and Mon Mothma to the open-roofed skimmer. The speeder bike was parked alongside. Shaak Ti swung one leg over the seat and started the engine.

Sta.s.s Allie settled in behind her. "Good luck," she said.

The Senators and the droid watched the two Jedi race off in the direction of the Senate Office Building; then, with Bail piloting, they boarded the oval-shaped Flash skimmer and dropped down into the wide canyon below the plaza. Free-travel traffic was thick even there, but Bail's skill got them through the worst of it and on course for the shelter entrances, which were just below the main skydocks of the Senate Medcenter. Without warning, two beams of scarlet light stabbed at them from somewhere above the dome of the Senate.

"Vulture droids!" Bail said. Padme clutched on to C-3PO as Bail veered away from the plasma bolts. The pod-winged droid fighter that had fired was one of several that were strafing vehicles, landing platforms, and buildings in the canyon. Republic guns.h.i.+ps were in close pursuit, unleas.h.i.+ng with powerful wingtip cannons. Padme's mouth fell open in astonishment. This was something she had never expected to witness on Coruscant. Bail was doing everything he could to keep clear of blaster bolts, plasma, and flak, but so was every other driver, and collisions quickly became part of the obstacle course. Dropping the skimmer lower still, Bail began to head for the nearest shelter entrance, as friendly and unfriendly fire ranged closer.

A flash of intense light blinded Padme momentarily. The skimmer tipped harshly, almost spilling its occupants into midair. Smoke poured from the starboard turbine nacelle, and the small craft went into a shallow dive.

"Hold tight!" Bail yelled.

"We're doomed!" C-3PO said. Padme understood that Bail was swerving for a landing platform that ab.u.t.ted a wide skybridge. Tears streaming from her eyes, stricken with a sudden nausea, she placed her right hand on her abdomen. Anakin! she said to herself. Anakin!

43.

Flags.h.i.+p of the Separatist flotilla, General Grievous's kilometers-long cruiser the Invisible Hand held to a stationary orbit above Coruscant's Senate District, just now in full sunlight, the most majestic of its forest of aeries standing tall above the clouds. Magnified holoimages of the buildings rose from the tactical table on the cruiser's bridge.

Grievous studied the images for a moment before returning to his customary place at the forward viewscreens. Glinting in daylight, the gargantuan wedge-shaped a.s.sault s.h.i.+ps that were, for good reason, the pride of the Republic fleet were positioned to provide cover for the planet's most important centers. In the first moments of the sneak attack, Grievous had caught a few of the s.h.i.+ps with their s.h.i.+elds contracted, and those hapless few glided now like flaming torches above Coruscant's pearl-strung night side, fire-suppression tenders and rescue s.h.i.+ps following in their wake, gobbling up escape pods and lifeboats.

The surviving cruisers were managing to keep their Separatist counterparts at bay. Although that scarcely mattered, since neither aerial bombardment nor invasion was important to the plan. From the point of view of Republic naval commanders, it must have appeared that Grievous lacked a plan; that desperation resulting from his previous defeats in the Mid and Outer Rims had driven him to gather what remained of his fleet and hurl it into a battle he couldn't possibly hope to win.

And indeed, Grievous was doing everything he could to encourage that misconception. The wars.h.i.+ps under his command were haphazardly dispersed, vulnerable to counterattack, concentrating fire on communications satellites and orbital mirrors, lobbing occasional and largely ineffectual volleys of plasma at the world they had come so far and risked so much to a.s.sail. All this was crucial to the plan. The tactics of terror had their place. From hundreds of areas on Coruscant's bright and dark sides streamed columns of pa.s.senger and cargo s.h.i.+ps, determined to reach the safety of deep s.p.a.ce. Indeed, there were almost as many vessels attempting to depart as there were arriving, constrained to autonavigation lanes and easy prey because of that. Elsewhere in local s.p.a.ce, inward-bound s.h.i.+ps that had reverted to reals.p.a.ce outside the battle zone had diverted from their approach vectors and were either hanging well to the rear, close to Coruscant's small moons, or deviating for the star system's inner worlds at sublight speeds. In the middle distance, droid fighters and clone-piloted starfighters were destroying one another with a vengeance.

Perhaps a wing of Vulture fighters had penetrated Republic lines at the start of the battle, but many had since been destroyed by orbital platform cannons, flights of high-alt.i.tude patrol craft, or ground-based artillery. Others had dashed themselves against the defensive s.h.i.+elds that provided additional safeguards for Coruscant's political districts.

But that, too, was part of the plan to inspire panic, since the sight of plasma bolts or plummeting s.h.i.+ps detonating against those transparent domes of energy could be terrifying. Smoke billowing from some of the capital world's deepest canyons told Grievous that a few of the spearhead droids had succeeded in evading both s.h.i.+elds and antiaircraft fire.

Similarly, tentative maneuvers on the part of Coruscant's home fleet vessels told him how eager their commanders were to break formation and engage Grievous head-on.

But they had a world to protect and, more important, were too meager in number to proceed with certainty. No doubt they were waiting for reinforcements to arrive from distant systems. Antic.i.p.ating as much, Grievous had planted surprises for those Republic battle groups closest to the Core, surprises in the form of ma.s.s-shadow mines, and had stationed wars.h.i.+ps at reversion points along the hyperlanes. If he couldn't prevent reinforcements from arriving, he could at least delay them. If everything went according to plan, the Separatist flotilla would be ready to jump to lightspeed long before reinforcements reverted in sufficient numbers to pose a serious threat.

Grievous took a long moment to absorb the silent battle that flared beyond the thick transparisteel of the bridge viewports. He loathed being so far from the action and bloodshed. But he knew that he had to be patient a while longer. Then all the waiting and frustration would be justified.

A Neimoidian addressed him from one of the duty stations. "General: comlink transmissions are returning to normal in sectors of the planet.

The enemy appears to have comprehended that we are using the jamming suite we employed to our advantage at Praesitlyn."

"This is not unexpected," Grievous said, without turning from the view.

"Instruct Group One commanders that they should continue targeting orbital mirrors and communication satellites. Relocate the jamming platform to zero-one-zero ecliptic, and intensify the s.h.i.+elds."

"Yes, General." The Neimoidian paused, then added: "I am compelled to report that we are sustaining heavy losses in all groups."

Grievous glanced at the tactical table. Group One alone had lost two Trade Federation carriers. The Neimoidians had managed to jettison the spherical core of one of the carriers, but the other had been blown completely in half. In the holofield, the tiny dots spilling from the carrier's curved and now separated arms were droid fighters. "Override the survival and engagement programs of those droid fighters," Grievous ordered. "Issue a command that they speed directly for Coruscant. They are to convert to explosive devices."

"Are any specific targets a.s.signed?"

"The outskirts of the Senate District."

"General, some of our fighters have already infiltrated that sector."

"Excellent. Command those to target landing platforms, skyways, pedestrian plazas, and shelters. Wherever possible, they are to dedicate themselves to overwhelming Coruscant's civil defense forces."

"Affirmative."

"Have any Republic auxiliaries arrived?"

"A task force comprising four light cruisers is decanting from hypers.p.a.ce and advancing from Coruscant's night side."

"Order our commanders there to engage them." Sooner than expected, Grievous thought. Ordinarily he would have given thought to contingency plans, but he trusted that Lords Sidious and Tyra.n.u.s would apprise him of any changes. Had it not been for the Deep Core hypers.p.a.ce routes the flotilla had taken, the attack could not have been launched successfully.

Those little-known routes had been furnished by Sidious, who was less concerned with battlefield tactics than with long-range strategies. It was warcraft of a sort Grievous had never practiced. Warcraft in which seeming defeats had resulted in victories; seeming foes proved to be allies. Warcraft of a sort that left the losers with nothing, and the winners with everything. The galaxy itself.

The Neimoidian communications officer had fallen silent, apparently in reception of an update from one of the duty stations. Now he said: "General, a group of Jedi starfighters has emerged from Coruscant's gravity well."

"How large a group?"

"Twenty-two craft."

"Deploy as many tri-fighters against them as are needed."

"Yes, sir." Grievous turned from the viewports. "Is the strike force a.s.sembled?"

The gunnery officer took a moment to reply. "Your gunboat is ready, and your elites are standing by in the launching bay."

"Battle droids, as well?"

"Fifty, General."

Grievous nodded. "That should suffice."

He glanced at the viewport a final time, then turned his gaze on the Neimoidian bridge crew. "Carry on. Consider every Republic vessel a target of opportunity."

"I'm sorry, Master, but the beacon still isn't transmitting."

Yoda continued to pace the floor of the Temple's computer room, then stopped and pointed the business end of his gimer stick at the Jedi seated at the beacon's control console. "Nothing for which to be sorry,"

he said in reprimand. "The Separatists' fault this is. Jamming transmissions from this sector of Coruscant, Grievous is."

The Jedi - - a brown-haired human female named Lari Oll - - lifted her hands from the console and shook her head in confusion. "How could Grievous - - "

"Dooku," Yoda cut her off. "Shares our secrets with his confederates, he does."

"If one of our starfighters could get past the Separatist blockade, there might be a way of relaying a message through the HoloNet."

Yoda nodded. "Already considered that, Master Tiin has. Attempt to recall Jedi from Belderone, Tythe, and other worlds, he will."

"Can they get back here in time?"

"Hmph. On Grievous's objective, that depends. Leave Coruscant soon and only slightly bruised, he might. Wait, we must, until he reveals his plan." Yoda paused to consider his own words, then leaned his weight on the gimer stick and looked hard at Lari Oll. "Enabled the comm is?"

"Intermittently, Master Yoda." He nodded his chin to the communications console. "Call Master Windu." Moments later, Windu's voice issued indistinctly from the console's annunciators.

"... Fisto and I... Senate building. Shaak... Allie... to the Chancellor's quarters in Five Hundred Republica. We... with them - - "

"Raised, the defense s.h.i.+elds are. Among one another, districts are unable to communicate." Yoda grimaced, then nodded once more. "Master Ti, try."

Lari Oll tried several frequencies before giving up. "I'm sor - - " She caught herself. "No response."

Yoda paced away from the console, deliberately turning his back to the glut of devices, screens, data displays, in a kind of countermeasure.

Shutting his eyes to distance himself farther, he stretched out with his feelings, placing in his mind's eye Mace and Kit Fisto skimming through the deranged sky; Shaak Ti and Sta.s.s Allie hurrying toward Palpatine's quarters in 500 Republica; Saesee Tiin, Agen Kolar, Bultar Swan, and other Jedi Masters and Jedi Knights streaking from Coruscant's envelope in their starfighters, local s.p.a.ce flas.h.i.+ng with energy bolts and globular explosions, s.h.i.+ps too numerous to count embroiled in a monumental battle... Grievous was loosing his war machines against both military and civilian targets, firing at anything and everything that wandered into his sights, commanding his droid fighters to dash themselves against Coruscant's defensive umbrellas or race down through traffic lanes, initiating chain reactions of collisions. And yet, for all the diversion, disruption, and terror those stratagems incited, they had little to do with the real battle. As was true of the war itself, the real battle was being fought in the Force.