The lieutenant took both pistols in one hand, and weighed Mace's lightsaber in the palm of the other. He gave it a thoughtful frown. 'The colonel said you're Mace Windu.' 'Did he?' The officer looked the Jedi Master in the eye. 'Is it true? You're really him? Mace Windu?' Mace admitted it.
'Then maybe I don't mind the nose so much.' The big man shook his head ruefully. 'I guess I'm lucky to be alive at all, huh?' 'You,' Mace said, 'should consider a new line of work.' The entrance to the Republic Intelligence station was a waterproof hatch; it was disguised as part of the checkered tile pattern on the bottom of a steaming mineral bath fed by the natural hot springs below the Washeteria. The lieutenant led Mace and Nick to a wading- stair from the deck down into the shallow end. Two sweating regulars brought up the rear, rifles slanted across their chests.
Nick made a face. 'Stinks in here. People really want to go in that?' 'Not many, I bet,' the big man said. 'If they did, it wouldn't make a real good secret entrance, would it?' A concealed latch opened a code panel that swung down from the stair rail. The lieutenant tucked Mace's lightsaber under his arm so he could punch some keys, and the field generator built into the stairs and the pool floor hummed to life. An electric crackle heralded the opening of a channel; walls of sizzling energy held back the sul-furously steaming water. Toward the deep end the channel became a tunnel. Another code panel opened the waterproof hatch, and openwork stairs with drains beneath them led down into a dry, brightly lit room filled with the very latest electronic surveillance, code-breaking, and communications equipment.
A handful of people in civilian clothes monitored the various stations like they knew what they were doing. There was an undertone of insistent muttering, and many of the console monitors showed only snow.
The lieutenant showed them to a small gloomy chamber with holoviewer walls and a heavy lammas table in the center. The only light in the chamber came from the holoviewers: they showed realtime images of the city. The ceiling sparkled with swooping droid starfighters and the hurtling ships they pursued. Burning buildings cast a dull flickering rose-colored glow that silhouetted a small plump man seated at the far end of the table.
'Master Windu. Please come in.' Geptun's voice was thin, and the self-deprecating chuckle he offered had a fragile edge. 'It appears that I miscalculated.' Mace said, 'We both did.' 'I never suspected that Jedi could be capable of such. savagery.' 'Neither did I.' 'People are dying out there, Windu! Civilians. Children.' 'If your concern for children had included Korunnai, we wouldn't be here right now.' 'Is that what this is? Revenge?' The colonel sprang jerkily to his feet. 'Do Jedi take revenge? How can you do this? How can you do 'You are not the only one,' Mace said evenly, 'with unreliable subordinates.' 'Ah-' Geptun sank slowly back into his chair and lowered his head into his hands. A weak, sickly laugh shook his shoulders. 'I understand. I didn't misjudge you. You misjudged jour people. This is all your mistake, not mine.' 'There will be plenty of guilt to go around. All that is important right now is the power to make it stop.' 'And you have this power?' 'No,' Mace said. 'You do.' 'You think I haven't fried'? You think I don't have every person in this station working to deactivate those starfighters? Look at this-you see all this?' Geptun's voice was going shrill. A shadow-wave of a trembling hand swept the images on the walls and ceiling. 'These are land- line sensors. Hard-wired. Want to see our remotes'?' He stabbed a control on the tabletop. All four walls and the ceiling fuzzed to eye-stinging white snow.
'See? Don't you see? All our signal-jamming controls are at the spaceport, too! Even if you wanted to order your pilots to stand down, you can't. We can't get through-it's out of our hands. We are helpless. Helpless.' In the white light from the screens, Geptun looked pale and disheveled. His eyes were red and puffy. His lips were swollen as if he'd been chewing them. Black sweat stained his blouse from his armpits to his belt.
Mace said, 'There is one more thing you can try.' 'Enlighten me.' 'Surrender.' Geptun's laugh was bitter. 'Oh, certainly. Why didn't I think of that?' He shook his head.
'Surrender to whom?' 'To the Republic,' Mace said. 'To me.' 'To you} You're my prisoner. And you're wasting my time.' His hand shook when he waved at the lieutenant. 'Take them away.' The big man shrugged. 'You heard him-' the lieutenant began, but he finished the statement with a sudden yelp of surprise and pain when the lightsaber he held ignited in his hand, the blade stabbing downward to drive a smoking hole through his thigh.
His hands opened; the pistols clattered to the floor and the lightsaber flipped into Mace's palm. 'You hold it like this,' Mace said, sizzling blade poised a centimeter from the end of the big man's nose.
The two regulars behind them cursed and fumbled with their rifles. Nick spun to face them and brought up his arms as both his pistol yanked themselves through the air to smack into his hands. 'Let's just not, okay?' The two militiamen, blinking and cross-eyed as they tried to focus on one muzzle apiece, settled on the better part of valor. Pale and grimacing, the lieutenant sagged against the holoviewer at his back, clutching his thigh.
'These are my terms,' Mace said evenly. 'The planetary militia will immediately cease all operations in the Lorshan Pass. You will turn over to me the starfighter control codes. And, as the ranking military official-and the ranking officer of the Confederacy-you will sign a formal surrender ceding Haruun Kal, and the Al'har system itself, to the Republic.' 'Colonel-' The lieutenant's growl was thin with pain. 'Maybe you oughta think about it.
Y'know? Think about it. I mean, all the guys-we got families here-' Geptun clutched the edge of the table, livid. 'If I don't?' Mace shrugged. 'Then I won't save your city.' 'How am I supposed to trust that you will? That you even can?' 'You know who I am.' Geptun trembled, and not from fear. 'This is extortion!' 'No,' Mace said. 'It's war.' The formal surrender had been drafted, witnessed, and signed right there in the Intel station.
'You know this has no legal standing,' Geptun said as he affixed his signature and retinal print. 'I sign this surrender only under duress-' 'Surrender is always made under duress,' Mace observed dryly. 'That's why they call it surrender.' Mace set the comm gear to automatically make a number of trans missions the instant signal- jamming abated enough that communications could resume. Many of the transmissions would be simple orders to the various battalions of militia to lay down their arms. More significant would be a HoloNet report to Coruscant with a copy of the surrender agreement, along with an emergency summons for a Republic task force. If the Republic could get here in force before the Confederacy did, their landing would be unopposed. By the time signal-jamming would end, he'd have control of the starfight-ers; even if the Separatists got here first, Mace would be in a position to make the Al'har system uncomfortably hot for them.
And if they tried to land, the spaceport controlled the planetary defenses as well.
Now all he had to do was control the spaceport.
They had the whole platoon plus the armored groundcar squad for escort through the chaos of Pelek Baw.
Geptun got them through the militia perimeter that stretched in a thick arc among the burning warehouses, then Mace stepped out of the groundcar. 'Nick. You drive.' He shooed away the rest of the militiamen. Geptun started to follow them. 'Not you, Colonel. Get in the car.' 'Me?' The ride to the spaceport had given Geptun time to recover his composure; he looked almost his old self again. 'You can't be serious! What do you expect me to do?' 'You'll transmit the deactivation codes. To make sure nothing goes wrong.' 'Why should I have to do anything What will you two be doing?' Nick stared through the windshield at the spaceport gates. 'Killing people.' Geptun looked at him, blinking as though he were expecting a punchline.
