Dark Tide 1: Onslaught Read Online Free Page B

She’d not made him forget the past and the lover he’d lost, she’d just helped him recapture the joy of life and all its possibilities.
    â€œI hope I’m not interrupting anything, Colonel.”
    Gavin looked up through the image of his family and shook his head. “No, Admiral, not at all.” He shut off the holoprojector, relieved that the Bothan admiral’s arrival had stopped the cycle of pictures right there, at the happy times.
    Admiral Traest Kre’fey bore a striking resemblance to the other members of the Kre’fey family Gavin had seen: the late General Laryn—the admiral’s grandfather—and the admiral’s brother, Karka. Despite having spent a certain amount of time in the company of Bothans, Gavin couldn’t remember any outside the Kre’fey family whose fur was pure white. Traest didn’t have the golden eyes the other two had; instead his were mostly violet with flecks of gold. Gavin assumed the violet came from Borsk Fey’lya’s line, since he knew the two of them were related through some complicated tangle of marriages between the two families.
    Traest wore a black flight suit that he’d unzipped down to midchest. He closed the door to Gavin’s office, then unceremoniously plopped himself down on the couch to the left of the door. Gavin moved from behind his desk to one of the two chairs making up the conversation nook in his office.
    He sat and rested his elbows on his knees. “It killed me in twenty-five seconds. What was it?”
    The Bothan smiled. “Congratulations. I died in fifteen in my first engagement. Pulling the biological targeting data on-line is what gave you some warning.”
    â€œIf I weren’t dead, I’m sure that would make me feel better.” Gavin frowned. “Do we know what it was?”
    The Bothan admiral raked claws back through his pale mane. “Two days ago Leia Organa Solo spoke to the senate and tried to warn them about an unknown alien force that had attacked several worlds on the Rim, out beyond Dantooine. She didn’t get a very warm reception. She left data behind, from which the simulation was created.”
    Gavin sat back in his chair. “You’re telling me that seed, that ‘thing,’ is a starfighter being used by folks who attacked the Outer Rim?”
    â€œYes. Technically it’s called a coralskipper by the species that created it. They grow them out of something called yorick coral. I know the name is not terribly inspiring of fear, but I assume it loses something in the translation from their tongue. I’ve designated them ‘skips’ for our purposes.”
    â€œAnd the princess brought this to the senate’s attention, and they didn’t listen?”
    Traest shook his head. “Opposing forces have been gathering power to fight over the whole Jedi question. It’s heated up because of the charge that a Jedi’s rash action sparked the Rhommamool conflict. A number of powerful senators saw the princess’s story as an attempt to divert attention from the Jedi question. It didn’t help that Jedi were key to defeating the invaders.”
    Gavin nodded. He’d never had a problem with Jedi and, in fact, counted one of them, Corran Horn, as a very good friend. There were some high-handed Jedi, but Gavin had seen those sorts of ego cases among fighter pilots, so their existence didn’t surprise him at all. The fact was that there were some tasks only Jedi could perform, and he’d been too long in the military to discard a force just because some of the elements were disruptive.
    â€œIs there any evidence that the invaders are still coming in?”
    â€œActual, no, but logic suggests that the expenditure of resources needed to travel from galaxy to galaxy necessitates gaining a foothold through which those resources can be replenished.” The Bothan smiled. “If you spend enough credits to get