Star Wars_ Episode VI_ Return of the Jedi - James Kahn [60]
At the fourth cross-corridor, six Imperial stormtroopers stood a wary watch.
There was no way around; the section had to be traversed. Han and Leia looked at each other and shrugged; there was nothing for it but to fight.
With pistols drawn, they barged into the entryway. Almost as if they’d been expecting an attack, the guards instantly crouched and began firing their own weapons. A barrage of laserbolts followed, ricocheting from girder to floor. Two stormtroopers were hit immediately. A third lost his gun; pinned behind a refrigerator console, he was unable to do much but stay low.
Two more stood behind a fire door, though, and blasted each commando who tried to get through. Four went down. The guards were virtually impregnable behind their vulcanized shield—but virtually didn’t account for Wookiees.
Chewbacca rushed the door, physically dislodging it on top of the two stormtroopers. They were crushed.
Leia shot the sixth guard as he stood to draw a bead on Chewie. The trooper who’d been crouching beneath the refrigeration unit suddenly bolted, to go for help. Han raced after him a few long strides and brought him down with a flying tackle. He was out cold.
They checked themselves over, accounted for casualties. Not too bad—but it had been noisy. They’d have to hurry now, before a general alarm was set. The power center that controlled the shield generator was very near. And there would be no second chances.
The Rebel fleet broke out of hyperspace with an awesome roar. Amid glistening streamers of light, battalion after battalion emerged in formation, to fire off toward the Death Star and its Sanctuary Moon hovering brightly in the close distance. Soon the entire navy was bearing down on its target, the Millennium Falcon in the lead.
Lando was worried from the moment they came out of hyperspace. He checked his screen, reversed polarities, queried the computer.
The copilot was perplexed, as well. “Zhng ahzi gngnohzh. Dzhy lyhz!”
“But how could that be?” Lando demanded. “We’ve got to be able to get some kind of reading on the shield, up or down.” Who was conning whom on this raid?
Nien Nunb pointed at the control panel, shaking his head. “Dzhmbd.”
“Jammed? How could they be jamming us if they don’t know we’re … coming.”
He grimaced at the on rushing Death Star, as the implications of what he’d just said sank in. This was not a surprise attack, after all. It was a spider web.
He hit the switch on his comlink. “Break off the attack! The shield’s still up!”
Red Leader’s voice shouted back over the headphones. “I get no reading, are you sure?”
“Pull up!” Lando commanded. “All craft pull up!”
He banked hard to the left, the fighters of the Red Squad veering close on his tail.
Some didn’t make it. Three flanking X-wings nicked the invisible deflector shield, spinning out of control, exploding in flames along the shield surface. None of the others paused to look back.
On the Rebel Star Cruiser bridge, alarms were screaming, lights flashing, klaxons blaring, as the mammoth space cruiser abruptly altered its momentum, trying to change course in time to avoid collision with the shield. Officers were running from battle stations to navigation controls; other ships in the fleet could be seen through the view-screens, careening wildly in a hundred directions, some slowing, some speeding up.
Admiral Ackbar spoke urgently but quietly into the comlink. “Take evasive action. Green Group steer course for Holding Sector. MG-7 Blue Group—”
A Mon Calamari controller, across the bridge, called out to Ackbar with grave excitement. “Admiral, we have enemy ships at Sector RT-23 and PB-4.”
The large central view-screen was coming alive. It was no longer just the Death Star and the green moon behind it, floating isolated