The Vigilant was three minutes from its destination, and Admiral Ar'alani was starting to wonder if her ship would be ready when they arrived when Senior Captain Kiwu'tro'owmis finally returned to the bridge. "Sorry about the delay, Admiral," Wutroowsaid as she crossed to Ar'alani's command chair. "Breacher One really didn't want to be fixed. But we persuaded it."Ar'alani looked over at the weapons status board. The number one breacher missile launcher still showed red . . . flicked to green."Excellent," she told Wutroow. "Be sure to log a commendation to the repair team. It's never a good idea to head into a situation with one hand stuck in your pocket.""Yes, ma'am," Wutroow said. "Though if I may, I'm still not entirely clear as towhat you're expecting the situation to be.""Because I'm not entirely clear about it myself," Ar'alani confessed. "It's just something about that last Nikardun base that still bothers me.""Which part?" Wutroow asked. "The lead time the attackers needed to set up that slow-approach asteroid attack? Or the fact that the base was too big to have been a listening post or anything else on Yiv's lists?""Both, plus something else I can't put my finger on," Ar'alani said. "I'm hoping I'll recognizeit when I see it.""Let's also hope the Council won't be annoyed with us for taking this little side trip," Wutroow warned. "We're already way beyond the time limit Ba'kif gave us for checking out Sunrise. Even Thrawn's already made it back from his pirate search, and you know how long he takes when he's on the hunt. And we still don't know why our friends with the Battle Dreadnought are so interested in this place.""It has to have something to do with the mining operation Senior Warrior Yopring spotted," Ar'alani said. "The amount of activity down there already tells us something big is happening. Add in the fighters who chased him away, and I'd say we've got it pinpointed.""Unless we've got two different groups in play," Wutroow pointed out. "The miners and the Battle Dreadnought could be fighting each other. But I suppose that's unlikely. My main concern is that even if we agree that the mines are the focal point, we don't know what's down there.""Mines usually mean metal ore of some sort.""Right, but digging doesn't always mean mining," Wutroow said. "It could also be something the inhabitants deliberately buried that someone else wants to dig up."Ar'alani frowned. That possibility hadn't occurred to her. "You mean