Enemy Lines II_ Rebel Stand - Aaron Allston [7]
So he situated the meter where he could see the readout from above. He shoved his way up and out of the access and turned an artificially cheerful smile on Leia. “Happy?”
“Happy. You’re very red.”
“That’s what happens when you stay upside down for too long. Could I get you some caf? Something to read? For while you’re here managing this repair operation, that is.” Ignoring sudden dizziness brought on by the flow of blood back out of his head, he stood.
Leia smiled, not at all put off by his snide comments. “Actually, I just came here to remind you that we need to see Tarc before we take off.”
“Yeah, I know. I just hate good-byes. Never could figure out how to make them happy.”
Leia lowered her voice to a whisper. “Speaking of which, do you have any advice on how we’re going to tell Meewalh she can’t come along on this mission? That hovering around me to do bodyguard duties will compromise any disguises that we try to use?”
Han matched her whisper for whisper. “How about persuading her to take a vacation?”
“Han.”
“How about, just before takeoff, we send her out to pick up a bottle of brandy, and then leave while she’s running the errand?”
“You’re not helping.”
He smiled and pulled her to him. “You’re not fooling anybody. You know exactly what you’re going to tell her. You just want me to be there when you do it. To back you up. Right?”
She offered him an expression of mock outrage. “No fair peeking into my mind like that.
““Right?”
Leia sighed and settled against him. “Right.”
But her expression, though merry, wasn’t entirely without worry, and he knew why. She couldn’t be entirely free from concern with one of their sons recently lost to war, the other missing and presumed by most to be dead, and their only daughter elsewhere in the Pyria solar system on a mission with her squadron. Han wondered if there would ever be a time when Leia’s expression was completely at peace.
Pyria System
Well within the dovin basal minefield, Jaina and her Twin Suns Squadron caught up with Mon Mothma, which was executing a turn back toward Borleias while, in the distance, a Gallofree cargo ship, as pudgy and unlovely as a Hutt in the middle of diving into a pool, edged toward them. Tiny lights winking around the freighter hinted at the battle that still went on, but they were few in number—and ever fewer, as the sensor blips representing coralskippers gradually disappeared from the screen.
“Twin Suns, this is Rebel Dream. Sensors show more skip squadrons incoming, but we think our payload will be out of the minefield and through with its last microjump before they arrive. It’s going to be close, though, so please stand by.”
Jaina grinned at the please. Because of the game she was playing with the Yuuzhan Vong, the deception in which she increasingly identified herself with their Trickster goddess, Yun-Harla, she was a step or two outside Borleias’s command structure, and all commanders had been privately instructed to treat her with the deference due a foreign dignitary. She sometimes wondered which of them were amused at playing along and which were irritated. This controller’s voice held no evidence of annoyance. “Twin Suns Leader to Rebel Dream, copy.”
Jaina brought her squadron around to cruise alongside Rebel Dream and waited. As the cargo vessel’s lines finally came into sharp focus with the naked eye, her name finally blipped onto her sensor board, Reckless Abandon, and she could see the nature of the starfighters protecting her—they were now organized into escort wings, all the fighting done. Most wore the white-and-dark-gray color scheme of Rebel Dream support craft, but one squadron, mixed A-wings and E-wings, was painted in glaring yellow with menacingly angular black stripes.
“What the Sith spawn are those?” Jaina asked.
“Twin Suns One, you have the Taanab Yellow Aces, Ace-One speaking.” The voice was male, amused. “We’re here to show the defenders of Borleias what flying is all about.”
Jaina winced. She’d forgotten that she had switched over to the general New