He clenched his teeth. If Thrawn was hoping whoever was in there would escape, he’d already lost his gamble. The two aft pursuers veered off, accelerating in turn as they chased after the shuttle. Qilori couldn’t read the markings on the velocity/intercept curves, but he had no doubt the two Nikardun would catch the craft long before it reached Rapacc or even the relative safety of one of the asteroid clusters. They would catch it, and with a barrage of laserfire or the more delicate twist of a tractor beam they would destroy or capture it.

On the tactical, he saw that the Springhawk, its errand apparently fulfilled, was now angling away from the inner system and the fleeing shuttle. Attempting, no doubt, to clear the system’s collection of orbiting debris and reach a safe hyperspace jump-off point before its remaining pursuer could get into combat range. Qilori eyed the tactical, noting that the Nikardun had put on a burst of speed of his own.

He frowned. The remaining pursuer. The last of three Nikardun ships that had been sitting at the Springhawk’s entry point, ready to give battle.

A point that Thrawn had deliberately specified out of the handful of safe vectors available. Was it simply bad luck that had brought them to a spot where three Nikardun had been waiting?

Maybe. Maybe he just didn’t know enough about the system.

But in that case, why hadn’t he come out of hyperspace much farther out and done at least a quick recon before committing himself and his ship to this vector? At least then he might have found a way or route that would have given his shuttle a better chance of getting somewhere before it was destroyed.

A cold chill ran up his back. No, Thrawn couldn’t be that short-sighted. Not the Thrawn whose battle tactics Qilori had had the misfortune to see firsthand.

Which left only one other option. Thrawn had arrived on this particular vector because he wanted the Nikardun to attack him.

Qilori looked back and forth among the banks of displays, trying to make sense of it all. Was the Springhawk just a feint, a diversion to let the actual intruder slip into the Rapacc system unhindered? Could there be someone out there aiming for the asteroid clusters, maybe, moving stealthily in the hope that with Nikardun attention focused out here they wouldn’t be spotted until it was too late?

But he couldn’t see anything like that on any of the displays. No other ships, no other vectors, no indication of anything else in the system. Surely the Chiss would have their own vessels marked, even if they were stealthed and undetectable to the Nikardun. Wouldn’t they?

The pursuing Nikardun patrol ship put on an additional burst of speed. Qilori watched nervously as it finally reached firing range—