Shatterpoint

He lifted its blade, and stood for a moment, staring into its blaze as though he could read his future there.

Perhaps he could.

That killing flame might be the only future he had.

He let it drop to his side but held it alight, and walked toward the spaceport gates.

"Follow me." Geptun engaged the groundcar's drive system and let the armored vehicle roll along behind the Jedi Master's deliberate stride.

Turbolaser towers loomed to either side. From the city at his back came the shriek of fighting ships cutting the air, the hammer of weapons and the rolling booms of exploding buildings, but beyond the durasteel bars of the gate, all was silence and stillness.

He reached the gate, and looked across the bare landing field toward the control center.

Empty. Silent. Vast. The dayfloods threw stark white glare.

His blade flashed. Durasteel clanged on permacrete.

Mace walked into the spaceport.

The groundcar rolled in after him.

He had no idea what to expect here. He thought he was ready for anything. He was almost right.

One thing he didn't expect was the crackle of a helmet speaker from the ground-level hatch of the turbolaser tower to his left.

"General Windu! General Windu, is that you?" Three troopers crouched in the doorway.

Mace called, "Yes." "Permission to approach, sir!" He waved them over, and they came at a run. They snapped to attention in perfect file.

"With the general's permission-the sergeant sent us out to see if it was you, sir!" "And it is," Mace said. "Me." "They said your ship blew up." "Did they?" "Yes, sir! They told us you were dead!" Mace Windu said, "Not yet." Mace stared at the bleak durasteel of the blast door while the trooper captain filled him in.

The blast door was a full meter thick, and locked with internal bolts of neutronium. Its surface was smooth. Dull matte gray. From the outside, it was controlled by a code panel. The inside had a manual wheel. When the wheel was engaged, the code panel was useless.

The command bunker was more secure than most treasure vaults. Only the swiftness of their assault had allowed Mace, Depa, and the Akk Guards to capture it in the first place; the defenders had not had time to swing it shut.

The brightly lit corridor seemed unreal. A full platoon of heavy assault troopers crouched in a tight arc on the white tile around the blast door, bolting tripods into the floor and charging weapons. Four more platoons waited in reserve, two down either direction of the corridor.

Mace stood in front of the door. Geptun sat on a heavy repeater's fusion pack, white-knuckled hands clutching his armored datapad. Nick sat on the floor with his back against the wall beside the door, eyes closed. He might have been asleep.

The trooper captain was designated CC-8,'349. He told Mace that the regiment had had no communication from the bunker since the news that the general had been killed; that was shortly after Master Billaba had ordered them to use the spaceport's ships to draw the droid starfighters down upon the city. The rest of the clone troopers had been ordered to stand ready to repel a militia infantry assault.

Since then, there had been no communication from the bunker. No one had entered. No one had left.

Mace had a good idea how the inside of the bunker looked right now. Too good an idea.

A surge of dark power spread across the city like the shock-front of a fusion bomb.

Behind that door was ground zero.

"Makes you wonder," Nick said slowly, eyes still closed, "just what they're doing in there." Mace said, "They're waiting." "For what?" He looked down at the lightsaber in his hand. "To see if I come back." Nick seemed to chew this over. He opened his eyes and pulled himself to his feet. He shook his arms loose and hooked his thumbs over his gunbelts. "Then I guess we shouldn't disappoint them." Mace frowned at the slug pistols holstered on Nick's thighs. "You should borrow a blaster." "Fine with these." "Blasters are more accurate. More stopping power." Mace's voice was grim. "More shots." Nick drew his right hand gun, turning it over as though admiring it for the first time. "Thing about slugs is, they only go one way," he said lazily. "Blasters are all well and good, but I don't particularly care to eat my own shot. Slugs don't bounce." "Off a vibroshield they will." Nick shrugged. "Not off a lightsaber." Mace lowered his head. He had no answer.

The sick weight that had gathered in his chest for so long now threatened to crush him altogether.

"Captain Four-Nine," he said slowly. "No one comes out of there but us. Do you understand? No one." "General, we should go in first-" "No." "With the general's pardon: That's what we are for." "Your purpose is to fight. Not to die uselessly. Master Yoda knew better than to send troopers against a single enemy Force-user on Geonosis; in that bunker may be as many as seven." "Eight." Mace glared at Nick. Nick shrugged. "You know it's true." The Jedi Master set his jaw.

"Eight." He turned again to CC-8,'349. "I will go in first. Your men will enter on my command. Two platoons. Come in shooting: blast anything that moves. But this is not search and destroy.

You're there solely to cover Colonel Geptun. You will take all available measures to protect him, and to ensure that he completes his mission. His mission is the objective of this operation, understood? If he fails, nothing else matters." "Yes, sir. Understood, sir." "The rest of you will remain out here to hold the doorway. If you have to. And if you can." "Um, if I might interrupt-?" Geptun coughed delicately. "Has anyone considered just how we are going to get zR?" "Just like we do everything else," Nick said. "The hard way." "Pardon?" "Shaped charges," Mace told him. He turned to the trooper captain. "Proton grenades. Blow the door." "General-!" CC-8,'349 stiffened to attention. "With the general's pardon, sir, Commander Seven-One's still in there! With more than twenty men. And there are prisoners to consider, sir.

Including civilians. If we use proton grenades, the casualties-" "There is no one in that room except the dead," Mace said heavily. "And the people who killed them." He nodded to Nick. "Cover my back from the doorway." The young Korun drew Chalk's pistol from his left holster. He held both guns low and loose, and nodded back.

"Colonel Geptun." The plump little Balawai pushed himself to his feet. He clamped the armored datapad under one arm but still held it with both white-knuckled hands. One of his kneecaps jumped and shuddered, but his voice was light and steady as ever. "Ready when you are, Master Jedi." "I can't protect you in there." "Lovely." "You won't be using the console. The transceiver unit itself is in a chamber below the bunker.