The Commerce Guild ship Starstone and the others had chosen to infiltrate grew larger in the transport’s cockpit viewports. Just over a thousand meters in length and bristling with electromagnetic sensor antennas and point-defense laser cannons, the Recusant-class support destroyer had taken a turbolaser bruising during the Battle of Kashyyyk, but its principal cannons and trio of aft thrust nozzles appeared to be undamaged.

Elsewhere local space was dotted with Imperial landers and troop transports, along with hundreds of freighters that had fled the surface of the tormented planet. Central to the latter craft, and a good distance from the support destroyer, floated the Interdictor cruiser that was preventing the traders’ ships from jumping to hyperspace.

Those trapped ships are the reason I was spared, Starstone thought.

The reason she had been rescued by Shryne …

“Any response from the droid brain?” she asked over Filli’s shoulder.

“Well, we’re chatting,” the slicer said from the cockpit’s comm suite. “It recognized the code we used to activate the facility at Jaguada, but it refuses to accept any remote commands. My guess is that it was rudely shut down during the battle, and wants to run a systems check before bringing the destroyer fully online.”

“Be best if we can keep from announcing ourselves,” Cudgel said from the copilot’s chair. “You think you can keep the brain from lighting up the entire ship?”

Chewbacca woofed in agreement.

“Not initially,” Filli said. “The brain will probably restore universal power gradually as part of its diagnostic analysis. Once that’s over and done with, I can task it to kill all the running lights, except for those around the forward docking bay.”

A sudden growl from Chewbacca called Starstone’s attention to the forward viewports.

Fore-to-aft, the pod-like warship was coming to life.

Cudgel muttered a curse. “The Interdictor’s scanners are bound to pick that up.”

“Just a couple of moments more,” Filli said.

Everyone waited.

“Done!” Filli announced.

In reverse order the destroyer’s running lights began to blink out, save for an array of illuminators that defined the rectangular entrance to the docking bay.

Filli flashed Starstone a grin. “The brain’s being very cooperative. We’re good to dock.”

Chewbacca brayed an interrogative.

“Any atmosphere?” Cudgel translated.

Filli did rapid input at the keyboard.

“The ship originally carried several squadrons of vulture and droid tri-fighters,” he said. “But unless the Gossams converted it fully to droid operation I’d expect there be atmosphere and artificial gravity in some areas …” His eyes darted to the display screen. “Looks like a bit of both: Gossam and droid crew.”

“Battle droids?” Starstone said.

Filli nodded. “ ’Fraid so.”

“You can’t shut them down?”

“Not without shutting down the command bridge.”

Starstone frowned and turned to Cudgel. “Gather up as many blasters as we’ve got aboard. And while you’re at it, you’ll find some rebreathers in the main cabin—just in case there’s no atmosphere.”

“You want a blaster,” he asked as he stood up, “or are you sticking with a lightsaber?”

“This is an occasion that calls for both,” she said.

“Archyr, Skeck, are you copying all this?” Filli said toward the audio pickup.

“Affirmative,” Archyr responded from the drop ship. “But we’ll precede you into the docking bay. We’re better armed and better shielded. After that there’s nothing to do but fight our way to the command bridge.”

Filli displayed a schematic of the destroyer on one of the suite’s monitor screens. “Most of the habitable areas are amidships, but the command bridge is in the outrigger superstructure above the bow.”

“Lucky break for us,” Archyr said. “It’s closer to the bay.”

Starstone was studying the destroyer when the drop ship came alongside the transport. Without having to be told, Chewbacca decelerated and fell in behind the smaller craft.

Starstone slipped into the vacant copilot’s chair to watch the drop ship glide into the bay. Almost immediately blaster bolts crisscrossed the darkness. By the time the transport nosed through the opening, battle droids were dropping like targets in a shooting gallery, and the deck was strewn with spindly body parts.

Rebreathers strapped to their faces, lumas to their foreheads, Starstone, Cudgel, and Filli were standing at the boarding ramp hatch when Chewbacca set the transport down. Shortly the Wookiee joined them there, the bowcaster he carried over his shoulder assembled and gripped in his hands.

As the transport’s outer hatch slid open, the harsh sibilance of blasterfire infiltrated the ship. Starstone and the others hurried out into the thick of the fighting, their headlamps casting long shadows all over the bay. Archyr and several well-armed Wookiees were off to one side, clearing a path through battle droids toward a hatch in the bay’s forward bulkhead.

Firing on the run and hurtling pieces of disintegrated droids, Starstone, Filli, Cudgel, and Chewbacca made a desperate dash for the hatch. The corridor beyond was crowded with battle droids marching in to reinforce those in the docking bay.

Explosive quarrels from Chewbacca’s bowcaster combined with blasterfire and deflections from Starstone’s lightsaber dropped a dozen droids at a time. But for every dozen destroyed, another dozen appeared. Archyr and some of the Wookiees brought up the rear, ultimately allowing Starstone’s contingent to shoot their way into a turbolift that accessed the destroyer’s outrigger arm.

Prepared for the worst, the four of them burst onto the command bridge, only to find a group of befuddled humaniform technical droids, outfitted with power studs at the backs of the heads that allowed them to be quickly and methodically shut down.

Realizing that the bridge had oxygen, everyone removed their rebreathers. Chewbacca dogged the hatch to the corridor while Filli centered himself at the ship’s control console and activated the bridge’s emergency lights.

“Gossams have longer fingers than I have,” he said in the scarlet glow of the illuminators. “This could take some time.”

“We’re running short as it is,” Cudgel said. “Just get the main cannons enabled.”

Battle droids on the far side of the sealed hatch were already trying to pound their way onto the bridge.

Filli went back to work, but a moment later said: “Uh-oh.”

Chewbacca loosed a trolling roar at him.

“Uh-oh, what?” Starstone asked.

Abruptly the destroyer lurched and began to nose about toward Kashyyyk’s crescent of bright side.

“The brain wants to complete the task it was in the middle of when the ship was shut down,” Filli said.

Starstone turned to him. “What was the task?”

“It thinks that the Separatists are losing Kachirho. It’s converting itself into a giant bomb!”

“Can’t you retask it?”

“I’m trying. It won’t listen!”

Cudgel muttered to himself, and Chewbacca issued a sound that was somewhere between a growl and a groan.

“Filli!” Starstone said sharply. “Let the brain think what it wants. Just assign it a new target.”

His blank stare yielded slowly to a grin of comprehension. “Can do.”

Starstone returned the smile, then glanced at Cudgel. “Comlink the Drunk Dancer to prepare to receive guests.”