Thrawn Ascendancy Book 3: Lesser Evil

“Wait,” Lappincyk cut him off, suddenly horrified. “To destroy it? Thrawn, we need that ship intact. You can’t—”

He broke off as the Jandalin again turned into a tight curve that once again had Thrass grabbing for his safety straps. “Thrawn!” Lappincyk shouted over the roar of the thrusters.

Thrawn didn’t answer. The curve straightened out, and Thrass once again saw the Paataatus ships directly in front of them.

But unlike the last two times he’d seen the aliens, this time they weren’t blazing toward the Chiss patrol ship. This time they were blazing away from them. Thrawn’s last maneuver had brought the Jandalin into position directly behind the attack formation.

And even as Thrass belatedly realized that all the twisting and turning had been about getting the Jandalin into precisely this position, the ship’s three spectrum lasers opened fire.

The closest of the Paataatus gunboats took the full impact of the barrage, and on the sensor display Thrass saw a warning cone appear as the lasers dug deeply into the alien’s main thrusters. Thrass watched closely, wondering if the next salvo would destroy the craft completely, or whether it would take a third or even a fourth attack to achieve that end.

But destruction was apparently not Thrawn’s goal for this battle. His second laser blast wasn’t directed at the damaged Paataatus ship, but instead focused on the next nearest gunboat. Another triple laser blast, and Thrawn again changed targets, this time to the third nearest. Even as he fired, the Jandalin was again in motion, accelerating toward the farther wing of the opening Paataatus formation.

Yet Thrass hadn’t heard Thrawn give any additional orders. Did that mean the pilot was still following the original course pattern? If so, had Thrawn really anticipated the battle this far in advance?

Thrass looked at the displays again, concentrating on the one showing the distant transport. It was all well and good to pick off the gunboats one by one from behind while they were focused on a different target. But that strategy had now left the disabled Chiss transport completely exposed to the alien forces arrowing in on it. The frigate was still there, two of the swarming gunboats were still undamaged—

He stiffened. Had that been a flash of laserfire from the frigate?

There was no indication of any fresh damage to the transport. But Thrass was certain he’d seen a flash.

And then, even as he tried to figure it out, the gunboat moving along the frigate’s portside flank sparked a small flash of its own. What in the name of Csilla—?

“Pilot: Ahead full power,” Thrawn ordered, his voice calm but with an edge of urgency to it. “Get me in optimal laser range of the frigate.”

“Yes, sir,” the pilot said, his words disappearing into the suddenly enhanced roar of the Jandalin’s thrusters.

“As you see, Thrass,” Thrawn said, half turning toward Thrass and raising his voice to be heard over the noise, “the target of a Crippler net doesn’t have to be motionless if you can drop it in front of him and persuade him to run into it.”

“Yes,” Thrass murmured. So that was what the twin flashes had been: the frigate and gunboat slamming into the pair of charged nets that Thrawn had earlier dropped in their path, with all the twists and turns designed to hide their release from the Paataatus.

Only in order to make it work, Thrawn had had to not only precisely anticipate the swarming tactic, but also predict with a high degree of accuracy the vectors the individual alien ships would travel on their way to the transport. Just like he’d apparently anticipated the maneuvers that would be needed to get the Jandalin behind the attack force.

And all he’d had to go on was the data from a single battle nineteen years ago?

Thrass stared at the back of Thrawn’s head, a chill running up his back. What kind of person could do all that?

“Fortunately, Crippler nets are large,” Thrawn commented, as if anticipating Thrass’s thoughts and concerns. “They’re nearly impossible to detect, certainly at warship attack speeds, and they don’t have to hit their targets squarely in order to temporarily disrupt their systems.”

“Impressive aiming nonetheless,” Lappincyk said. “What now?”

“We retrieve the transport and their hijacked cargo and leave,” Thrawn told him. “Observe the Paataatus ships.”

Thrass again looked at the displays. The gunboats had broken off their attack, the ones Thrawn had fired on limping away from the transport with the clear intent of making their escape into deep space. The single undamaged gunboat had joined with its partially paralyzed comrade and were together nudging the semi-incapacitated frigate off its attack vector toward a similar departure.

“Senior Aide Lappincyk?” the pilot called over his shoulder. “We’re coming within laser range of the Paataatus frigate. Do we attack?”

“Mid Commander Thrawn?” Lappincyk asked.