He cut off the connection before the Dromo’s captain could protest, then dispatched the shuttles.

“If there’s anything to it,” Jard said. “We’ll soon know.”

ARYN AND ZEERID WATCHED first one then another shuttle peel away from the other vessel and start toward them. Zeerid cursed as their freighter began to slow.

“Are we stopping?” Aryn asked.

Zeerid nodded, licked his lips. “I think we go hot right now. I don’t want a cold ship when they spot us.”

“If you fire up the engines, their scanners will pick us up.”

“They’re going to see us anyway. Those shuttles are coming. Let’s fire her up and make our run. You ready?”

Aryn watched the shuttles close the gap between them. She nodded. “Ready.”

Zeerid pushed buttons and flipped switches. Fatman came back to life.

THE COMMUNICATIONS OFFICER SPUN in his chair. “Sir, secured communication from Darth Angral. Shall I put it through?”

“What have the shuttles found?” Malgus asked Jard.

“Not there yet, my lord.”

Vrath turned his head sideways, as if he heard better out of one ear than another.

“Anomalous reading just flared and vanished,” the scan officer said.

“Vanished?” Jard asked.

“I’m getting something else,” said the scan officer.

“Darth Malgus,” said the communication officer. “Darth Angral insists I put him through.”

“Put him through,” Malgus said irritably, and slapped the comm button. He put a wireless earpiece in his ear so Angral’s words would be heard only by him.

“What is it, my lord?”

Darth Angral’s smooth voice carried over the connection. “Malgus, how goes the patrol?”

“I am in the middle of something, Darth Angral. I beg you to be brief.”

Before Angral could reply, the scan officer said, “Engines. Sir, I think there’s a ship hiding in the Dromo’s shadow.”

“That’s it!” Vrath said. “That is them!”

“Alert the shuttles,” Jard said. “Now.”

“ENGINES READY TO BURN,” Zeerid said.

The shuttles, perhaps a kilometer or two away, either spotted them or got word of Fatman’s presence. One peeled left, the other right. Fatman’s thrusters pushed it off the freighter. Zeerid engaged the ion drives and Fatman screamed through the space between the two shuttles. He throttled the freighter’s engines to full and headed straight for the next nearest freighter.

Aryn had flown with Zeerid many times but had forgotten what an instinctive flier he was. He seemed to consult his instruments only rarely, instead relying on intuition, experience, and his own reflexes.

A bit like Force-piloting without the Force, she supposed.

Fatman twirled a spiral as it closed on the nearest freighter and pelted along its exterior.

“Give me a hug,” Zeerid muttered.

Aryn gripped the armrests of her chair, expecting the red lines of the frigates’ plasma cannons to light the sky at any moment, but no fire came. She checked the scanner. No fighters yet, either.

“What are they waiting on?” she said.