"He comes at us again, Vicelord," the Neimoidian at the sensors called. "Same fighter, same vector."
"Same response, then," Kav called back, leaning forward to study the displays. "Perhaps he is trying to judge exactly how far our control extends."
"Be careful," Doriana warned. "If they figure out how to jam the signal, those starfighters will go dormant."
"And will self-destruct a few minutes later," Kav said impatiently. "Thank you, Commander Stratis; I am familiar with my own weaponry. See-again he pulls back, no wiser than he was before."
"Unless he's a decoy," Doriana said, searching the other displays. "Don't forget the cruiser that detached itself from the group the same time the fighter did."
"I have not forgotten," Kav assured him. "But that one has merely traveled along our flank, and has made no attempt to attack or move closer."
Doriana shook his head. "He's up to something, Vicelord."
"Whatever it is, it will gain him nothing," Kav said. "Outbound Flight is not due for another nine days. That is more than enough time to choose how we will deal with this annoyance." On the display the retreating fighter suddenly flipped over and again charged in. "Vicelord-" a Neimoidian began.
"Same response," Kav cut in. But this time there was a note of satisfaction in his voice. "I see now his plan, Commander Stratis. He hopes to drain the starfighters of their fuel and then drive in unopposed. What he does not realize is that I still have all theDarkvenge 's starfighters in reserve, plus half of theSeeker 's."
"Maybe," Doriana murmured, his vague sense of uneasiness deepening as he watched the same scenario play itself out for a third time. Surely Mitth'raw'nuruodo could come up with something better than to just run the same simple-minded attack over and over.
And always on exactly the same vector. Was he trying to find a weakness in the droid starfighters' attack formation?
Once again the starfighters chased the intruder away. Once again, the alien ship flew out of range and flipped over for another run. The show repeated twice more, and Doriana was just checking the chrono to see how close the starfighters were to their twenty-five-minute fuel time limit when Kav abruptly slammed his fist on the arm of his chair. "I weary of this game," he said. "You-order theKeeper to move toward the aliens."
"Careful, Vicelord," Doriana cautioned as the comet operator turned to his board. "Let's not be too quick to split up the fleet."
"I have been more than patient," Kav countered. "It is time to end this. Signal theKeeper to advance, and to launch the rest of its starfighters into shield configuration-"
"Hold it," Doriana cut in. Suddenly the scenario had changed. The fighter was again retreating with starfighters in pursuit, but this time the rest of the alien force had leapt forward, driving hard toward the gap that had opened up between them and the main task force.
"And so they make their final mistake," Kav said with satisfaction. "Signal the starfighters to attack." The Neimoidian acknowledged and tapped at his board.
But to Doriana's disbelief the droids didn't respond. Instead, they continued in pursuit of the retreating fighter.
"Order them to attack!" Kav snapped again. "What are you doing? Call them to the attack!"
"They do not respond," the other Neimoidian called back. "Impossible," Kav insisted. "They cannot possibly be jamming our signal."
"They're not," Doriana said grimly. "If the starfighters weren't getting a signal, they'd have shut down and gone dormant. But they're still flying at full power."
"But they are flyingaway from us. How can this be?" Kav demanded in clear bewilderment.
"Never mind thehow," Doriana spat. "Here they come."
"I don't believe it," Car'das murmured as he watched the droid starfighters ignore the incoming Chiss ships completely as they headed mindlessly toward deep space. "How did you get them to dothat? "
"The command signal uses a rolling encryption," Thrawn explained as theSpringhawk shot forward past the now vanished outer defense screen. "But with so many fighters requiring signals, I knew the rotation would have to be a limited one. It turns out that there are only three separate encryption patterns for this group. I simply recorded the version the droids would be expecting next, then broadcast it to them with enough power to override whatever their masters in the battleship were trying to send."
"But how could you figure out-oh," Car'das interrupted himself as it finally clicked. "With your fighter always going in on the same vector, and the droids' command always the same come-out-of- this-formation-and-attack-the-enemy-on- this-vector code, the only part that ever changed was the encryption pattern itself."
"Which allowed us to isolate the command we wanted and duplicate it," Thrawn confirmed. "The secret to successful analysis, Car'das: whenever possible, reduce matters to a single variable."
Ahead, the nearest starfighters in the inner screen were starting to shift positions, moving from their general defense pattern onto intercept vectors. "I don't think that's going to work on the rest of them, though," Car'das warned. "They're coming from different initial formations, and there are probably entirely different codes and encryptions for them."
"That doesn't matter," Thrawn assured him. "All I needed was to get past the outer group and into closer range." He tapped a key on his board. "All vessels: attack patternd'moporai."
"Here they come," Doriana muttered, his fingers digging tensely into the couch cushion beside him. On the face of it, there was still no way Mitth'raw'nuruodo's pitiful collection of patrol ships could do anything against the combined might of the Trade Federation task force. No way at all.
But the alien commander had just gotten past three groups of droid starfighters without firing a shot, and that was supposed to be impossible, too. Whatever Mitth'raw'nuruodo had in mind for his next trick, Doriana had a strong suspicion he wasn't going to like it.
Yet even through his apprehension, a small detached part of him was looking forward to seeing what that trick would be. He didn't have long to wait. The incoming aliens were widening their formation now, sacrificing the protection of overlapping shields to gain extra maneuvering room. Swarms of starfighters from the nearer parts of the defense screen were breaking their own formation in response, sweeping in over a wide, three-dimensional wavefront toward the intruders. The two groups were nearly within laser range of each other..
And then each of the alien fighters launched a single missile.