Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 01_ Outcast - Aaron Allston [105]
Winter hadn't told her much. It was imperative that she help the Jedi; check. It was related to her son's condition; check. It was very important that she not be identified; not just a check, but a guideline she'd followed since she was a teenager. She needed to get near and stand by; check. All of this was second nature to her. Though she largely operated on the proper side of the law these days, she was a felon's daughter, a smuggler and rebel herself. She knew how to acquire matériel when she needed it, how not to leave forensic or visual evidence. She was happy to do it, too, when she knew why.
“Credcoin, this is Slicer. Do you read?”
Mirax's new call-sign was Credcoin; she frowned at that, wondering if Winter thought she was all about money. The woman had practically raised the three Solo children—she must know how positively frantic Mirax was feeling about Valin, both his illness, if that's what it was, and his horrific imprisonment.
And who was Slicer? The voice, possibly female, was distorted. Mirax raised her comlink. “Slicer, Credcoin. Go.”
“Our target is probably coming out of a workers' access hole right in front of the prison. It is imperative, I say again imperative, that we grab him.”
“Understood.” Mirax angled over to line up on the throughway leading straight to the crater. From this direction, she'd have to come in over the prison, a distinctly illegal approach, and make a steep dive down to surface level. “How do I grab him?”
“No idea. Maybe just harass him. He's armed and very, very dangerous.”
“Oh, good. Who's my backup?”
“All of us, when we get there.”
“Who's my backup right now?”
“No one.”
Mirax shut up. She didn't want to ask more questions that yielded bad answers.
An Alliance Security vehicle rose into her path, broadcasting on all channels for civilian traffic to turn away from this zone. Mirax dipped her speeder and flashed by under it so close that she instinctively ducked. She was pretty sure the pilot got a good look at her, which was another thing that would let him know something wasn't right; she was wearing a sheet of transparisteel foil wrapped around her face, concealing everything but eyes and nose, visually distorting her features.
She was over the prison now. Spotlights, rising to illuminate her, almost blinded her. She could distinctly hear the alarms sounding within the structure. She put the speeder into a dive.
There was the crater, looking much like an asteroid-impact site, surrounded by official vehicles. Men and women on the ground were now mostly looking up at her. There was no sign of—
No, there he was, a tousle-haired man in a gray worker's jumpsuit, a blaster rifle in his hands, climbing unnoticed from an access hole. Mirax nodded. Her target was in sight. Now how to get him was the question.
Best tactic for the moment: buzz him, force him to flee, keep him moving until her backups arrived. And she'd try not to get shot in the meantime.
Leveling off just above the surface, ignoring the new spotlights being trained on her from several Alliance Security vehicles, she aimed for her target—and then her head banged against the viewport to her left as she was sideswiped from that side. Startled, suddenly dizzy, she angled off to her right, straight toward a government office building, most of its viewports dark.
She vectored hard and found herself roaring along the face of the building at a right angle to the ground, her repulsors barely keeping her from scraping along the building front; their force blew several viewports completely in. Then she was angling away from the building face and leveling off once more, rubbing her temple.
She shook her head and sent the speeder into a tight loop, heading back toward her target. What had happened?
Running