Republic Commando_ True Colors Part 7

"He's been out here for four hours, Kal'buir." Ordo activated his helmet's infrared filter, adjusted it to its most sensitive setting, and cast around on a square search of a twenty-meter grid. "If he's dead, I might still pick up a temperature differential, but it's unlikely."

Skirata paced the imaginary grid with slow, silent deliberation, sweeping a handheld scanner across the surface to locate holes and fissures, and then scanning for temperature changes. Ordo suddenly wondered if he'd been tactless, and that Kal'buir might be upset at the thought of Vau being dead. The two men had been at each other's throats ever since he could remember, but they also went back a long time, including all those years training clones on Kamino, erased from the galaxy and dead to all who knew them. "I'm sorry, Buir" he said.

"Don't be." Skirata checked a readout on his forearm plate. "I'm scanning for metals. This detects twenty meters down."

Skirata might have been genuinely unmoved, interested only in the proceeds of the robbery. For once Ordo couldn't tell, but he doubted it. Skirata felt everything on raw nerves. They paced slowly, leaning against the wind, and Skirata seemed to be cycling through his comlink frequencies be-cause Ordo was picking up spikes on his system. Vau might have left a link open. It was worth trying.

"No paw prints," Skirata said. "Wind's probably swept them away."

Ordo switched from infrared to the penetrating sensor. It was like checking in mail slots, a tedious progression from one hole to the next. A recent fall of snow was drifting, filling in the depressions. "He could be anywhere. He might even have got out and found shelter."

Skirata tilted his head down as if listening. Ordo caught a burst of audio on the shared comlink. "If he is, his helmet systems are down."

"I'm getting static."

"He might be down too deep."

Ordo was starting to feel the cold seeping through his armor joints. If this had been his GAR-issue suit, he'd have had temperature control, but his Mandalorian beskar'gam was more basic. He'd fix that as soon as he got the chance, just like he'd upgraded his helmet. It wasn't as if he spent a lot of time working in it. He'd never thought to check how Vau's suit was configured: it was just matte black, an image he dreaded as a kid, and now unsettlingly like Omega's Katarn rig. Black was the-color of justice. Kal'buir's armor was sand gold, the color of vengeance. Ordo had opted for deep red plates simply because he liked the color.

But black or gold, if Vau didn't have coldproofing or some other protection, he'd be dead now.

"Don't laugh, son," Skirata said, "but I'm going to try something old-fas.h.i.+oned. Just like you talked your way past the picket."

He stood with his arms at his sides and yelled.

"Mird! Mird, you dribbling heap, can you hear me?" The wind was drowning out his voice. He clenched his fists and tried again. "Mird!"

Ordo joined in calling the stall's name. He almost expected to see a patrol closing in on them, but his helmet sensors showed nothing.

"Strills can stand cold," Skirata said, pausing to get his breath. "And they've got better hearing than humans. It was worth a try." He tapped his forearm controls, adjusting his helmet's voice projector to maximum. "Mird!"

How would they even hear the animal if it responded to their calls? Ordo was about to go back and start using the s.h.i.+p's sensor systems to probe deeper into the ice, but he heard Skirata say "Osi'kyr!" in surprise and when he turned, the snow was shaking. The thin crust broke. A gold-furred head pushed through like a hideously ugly seedling, a thick layer of white frost on its muzzle.

"Mird, I'll never curse you again," Skirata said, and knelt down to scoop away the chunks of ice. The animal whined pitifully. "Is he down there, Mird? Is Vau down there?" He hesitated and then rubbed the folds of loose skin on its muzzle. "Map the tunnel for me, Ord'ika."

The holochart hung in the air, a 3-D model of the ice be-neath them. The tunnel that Mird had struggled out of ran down at a thirty-degree angle and curved close to the margin of the lake before snaking away again and disappearing off the chart in the direction of Jygat.

"It's about sixty meters down to the bend, and the diameter there is only a meter," Ordo said. "If he fell, chances are he came to rest at the bend."

"Long way down." Skirata had his arms around Mird, and Ordo wasn't sure if he was hugging the animal or trying to shelter it. It was a marked change of att.i.tude, given that he'd thrown his knife at it more than once in the past. "Mird, find Vau. Good Mird. Here." He took out a length of fibercord from his belt and knotted it around Mird's neck. "Go find him. You couldn't drag him out, could you? Is he stuck? Find him."

Mird struggled back down the tunnel, making rasping noises with its claws like a skater, and then there was silence again.

"Mird's clever, but a strill can't tie knots," said Ordo. "So if Vau's dead or unconscious, what are you doing?"

"Measuring," said Skirata. He had a tight grip on the line, watching it intently. Eventually it went taut. "Fierfek, there's never a Jedi around when you need one, is there? Bard'ika could have done his Force stuff and located Vau right away." He tugged on the line. "Back, Mird. Come back." The line went slack again. "Given how much line I'm holding, minus the loop, Vau's at fifty-eight meters."

"If Mird reached him."

"It'd stay with Vau. Trust me, it stopped where Vau is when the line went taut. Now all we have to do is get to him."

The solution was obvious to Ordo. "We breach the tunnel at the thinnest point of the ice, which is where it runs next to the lake, and that's less than eight meters thick."

"And flood the tunnel. .."

"No."

"Or flush him into the lake and lose him. Either way, he's dead."

"Either way," Ordo said, utterly relieved that he recalled every line of the Deep Water manual, "I line the s.h.i.+p up, star-board-side-to, and work through the ice with the boarding tube from the air lock. Dry entry."

Skirata looked up at him for a moment. Ordo didn't need to see his face to know what he was thinking.

"You still manage to amaze me, son. You really do."

"Just hope we don't hit rock."

Mird crawled out of the runnel and flopped at Skirata's feet, panting. It was a struggle to get the strill into Aay'han, probably because it thought they were leaving Vau behind, but it was weak and frozen, and that meant Skirata and Ordo could subdue it between them.

Ordo set the s.h.i.+p down on the frozen surface of the lake. If the ice cracked and they fell through, that was fine, because it would save him the trouble of smas.h.i.+ng through. But it didn't.

s.h.i.+elds. What did it say about s.h.i.+elds when diving? Re-configure. He tapped in the commands and waited. Amber indicators changed one by one to green. Okay, now avoid any serious impacts . . .

Ordo lifted Aay'han clear of the surface, climbed steeply, and fired a laser round at the lake at what he hoped was a safe distance from the ice wall. Steam plumed up beneath him like a geyser. A chunk of ice lifted vertically and bobbed for a second before sliding back again.

The lake would freeze over fast. "Brace for dive," he said, and took her in a slow nosedive.

"Osik."

"Oh yes..."

Do other people live their lives like this? Do they take these kinds of risks?

It wasn't the time to worry about that. Ordo hadn't yet met a problem he couldn't solve or a situation he couldn't survive. Aay'han pushed through the shattered surface, and even at low speed it seemed like cras.h.i.+ng into solid rock. For a moment Ordo thought he'd got it badly wrong, but the slow ice impact wasn't anywhere near as violent as Weapons fire, and the s.h.i.+eld held. Chunks sc.r.a.ped and screeched as she pa.s.sed through the slush layer, and then everything went quiet in clear twilight water. They were in the lake itself. Now he had to align the air lock with Vau's position.

"You knew the hull would take that, right, Ord'ika? Skirata jumped out of the copilot's seat and pulled off his helmet. He looked shaken.

"Of course I did. Well, ninety percent sure."

"Okay, close enough. Let's do some scanning."

The air lock was nearly two meters in diameter. Ordo aligned it at Vau's rough position and used the penetrating sensors to look for a dense ma.s.s. Skirata went into the star-board cargo bay with his metal scanner and opened the inner air lock hatch. The warning light lit up on the console, and Skirata's voice crackled over the s.h.i.+p's intercom.

"Big immobile lump of durasteel and beskar about six meters in," he said. "Good old Mandalorian iron. You can't beat the stuff. That's Vau all right."

Six meters: that was a pretty thin wall between the tunnel and the water. At least there was no worm activity, but there was no way of knowing if the shock wave from the laser round would attract them. "Let me reposition. I'm a meter off."

"I can't tell if he's alive."

"Okay, we've got to cut through that ice now."

"Heat it," Skirata said.

"We can vent the melt.w.a.ter through the tanks."

"About eighty cubic meters. Maybe less."

"Okay." Ordo hiked the thermostat on the environmental controls: they needed to raise the temperature of the exposed ice on the other side of the air lock any way they could. "Maybe a combination of heat and cutting."

"And Mygeeto TC wants us out of here in ... about an hour and a half."

Ordo extended the outer docking ring until he felt it embed in the lake wall. "Come out of the air lock, Kal'buir. I need to test for leaks. Clear?"

"Clear. I'm going to see what we've got in the tool locker."

"Okay, closing inner air lock." The status light changed to green again. He put Aay'han on autohelm to hold her steady against the ice wall. "Opening outer hatch."

The sensors showed no leaks. When Ordo maneuvered the safety cam inside the air lock chamber, he saw a smooth gla.s.sy disc of dirty ice. A few meters on the other side of that lay Walon Vau. If they got it wrong while they tried to cut through the wall, the water would flood in and sink Aay'han. It was a lot of trouble to go to for a few credits and a man both of them disliked.

On too many occasions, Ordo had wished Vau dead. Now he found himself willing the chakaar to stay alive.

Special Operations Brigade HQ, Coruscant, General Arligan Zey's office, 471 days after Geonosis Sev thought it was just as well he had a reputation for being uncommunicative. General Zey walked up and down the short line of four commandos as if he was doing an inspection, pausing occasionally to stare at a detail of their armor or look into their eyes.

If the Jedi thought that would psych out Delta Squad, he'd have a long, long walk ahead of him.

Sev stared straight ahead, hands clasped behind his back, boots planted firmly at shoulder width. In his peripheral vision, General Jusik sat on a table swinging his legs. His disheveled Padawan image didn't fool anyone. Sev had been on enough operations with him to know that he could make Scorch look overcautious. Zey's ARC trooper aide, Captain Maze, prowled the room as if he wasn't listening to the debriefing. On balance, Sev preferred the Null ARCs. They understood in a way that the men trained by Fett simply didn't.

Zey came to a halt in front of Boss and stood with his nose almost touching his. "I'm not stupid," he said quietly. "Am I, Sergeant?"

"Sir, no sir!" Boss barked.

"Want to tell me what went wrong with your exfiltration?"

"Sir, we encountered some resistance and were forced to exit the complex via an unreconnoitered pa.s.sage, sir."

Sev felt for Boss. They'd all made the decision to stick with Vau, but Boss was... the boss. So he got it in the neck. Sev found the occasional trips back to HQ unsettling. He wanted to be back out in the field with just his brothers for company, because Coruscant wasn't their world, and he'd already had enough of it.

Zey was still in Boss's face. "This wouldn't have anything to do with Skirata, would it, Three-Eight?"

"Sir, no sir!"

Well, that much was true. n.o.body had actually lied to Zey yet, because Jedi had a way of telling if someone was lying. Zey took a pace back, seemed to be suppressing a smile, and then shook his head.

"Well," he said at last, sitting down behind his fancy lapiz-inlaid desk. "Good result on Mygeeto. General Ki-Adi-Mundi has sent his commendation."

Don't care. What's happened to Sergeant Vau?

"Can we eat it, sir?" Scorch asked, straight-faced.

"I realize you returned with indecent haste, Delta." Zey turned to Maze. "Captain, once I'm through with this briefing, take Delta straight to the mess and stand over them while they eat the recommended daily intake."

Maze, looking less than thrilled by his nursemaid duties, grunted, "Sir." Jusik, who'd been staring out the window, suddenly flinched as if someone unseen had walked up be-hind him. Jedi were weird.

"But before you eat, gentlemen, here's your new brief." Zey flicked a holochart into life, and the familiar planet-studded grid settled in the air over the briefing table. "And this comes straight from the Chancellor-a direct personal order. Find Chief Scientist Ko Sai."

Boss was still doing the talking, which suited Sev just fine, because he was far more interested in Vau's fate and was now watching Jusik carefully. The kid was like a holoreceiver. He picked up all kinds of stuff from distant events. Maybe he'd detected something now. He certainly looked distracted.

"And when we find her, sir?"

"Bring her back in one piece."

"b.u.mmer," Fixer muttered. "Sir."

Zey managed a smile. "I know you have little to love the Kaminoans for, gentlemen, but I don't make the rules. Lama Su is adamant that Ko Sai defected and that she didn't die. He won't give his reasons, but that probably doesn't matter because the Chancellor wants a tame Kaminoan scientist for our own use so we aren't beholden to Tipoca, should they ever change their minds about our favored-customer status." The general shook his head as if he was arguing with him-self. "So haul her back here. Top priority. He ordered me to put the best team on it."

Sev accepted that it was true. They were better than Omega because they didn't go soft and get diverted by personal issues. They had Vau to thank for that.

"She's been gone a year, sir. Why make the move so late in the day?" Boss asked.

"I'm not privy to that information, Sergeant," Zey said carefully. "But the intel we do have, via the Kaminoans, suggests that she's pa.s.sed through Vaynai within the last six months."

Sev didn't know the Kaminoans had any kind of intelligence, seeing as they almost never left their homeworld, but they could clearly buy it in from outside. He chalked Ko Sai up to the long list of objectives that Delta had been set and tried to come to terms with his fears about Vau.

Boss broke position and wandered over to the holochart to locate Vaynai. "Who's tracking her, sir?"

"You."

"Understood."

"The report came from Ryn who do occasional work for the Republic. She's probably long gone, but this is the first positive lead we've had."

Sev sneaked a look at Jusik. Something had definitely distracted him, and it wasn't what was happening on the parade ground. The Jedi looked at him and gave him a discreet thumbs-up.

What does that mean? Cheer up? His gravball team won? Vau's okay?

Boss, Scorch, and Fixer were engrossed in the discussion on the significance of Vaynai-plenty of ocean, and she wasn't likely to be hiding out on Tatooine-and Sev just stood there, eyes pointing in the appropriate direction to look like he was following the debate.

Fear. Yes, it was fear. Everyone got scared, but this was different: a gnawing, hollow void in his stomach. He'd let Vau down when it mattered. If Vau survived, he'd beat Sev within a breath of his life. If he didn't-he'd haunt him. Try harder, Sev. You let your brothers down, you let me down, you let the whole shabla army down. Try harder, you lazy little chakaar, or next time it really will hurt.

Sev had tried so hard that he'd collapsed on his bunk most nights without even getting his fatigues off, and then had to catch up on his laundry in the early hours when reveille made his heart nearly leap out of his chest and he got up with his head still buzzing with lack of sleep.

He was five years old. He hadn't forgotten.

Sev was now the best sniper in the Grand Army because he didn't want to let anyone down.

". . . and this stays within this room, gentlemen, because this is the Chancellor's pet peeve." Zey's tone jerked Sev back to the present. "n.o.body else in Special Operations knows about this, and I really don't want Skirata to know, be-cause ... fine man though he might be, he does have an issue with Kaminoans. Any man who refers to them as tatsus.h.i.+ and actually boasts of recipes is probably best kept out of the loop. Dismissed."