Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 01_ Outcast - Aaron Allston [97]
And, Leia reflected, the pilots sitting with her and Tendra at the head of the table—Han, Lando, and Nien Nunb—weren't exactly slouches themselves.
Lando rapped a shot glass on the table to divert everyone from catching-up talk and bring them back to the subject at hand. “So we have a mixed bag of starfighters—X-wings, A-wings, a Blade-Thirty-six, an Eta-Five acquired under circumstances I won't discuss, and a TIE bomber whose owner wants it kept in the exquisite condition it now enjoys, so don't even think about scratching the paint.
“The next two crews of pilots I'll be briefing in here are the rescue vehicle crews and the subsonics crews—those are the airspeeders you saw lined up outside. Each of you will be paired with one of them. Their job is to precede you into the cavern, activate the monstrous sonic systems we've mounted on their speeders, and drive out the animal life. Sometimes they'll be doing it at the same time as your missile pass, or after, if you're firing detonators on timer. If your detonator's supposed to go off on impact, they'll be preceding you.”
Wedge took another sip of his drink. “Who's acting as mission control?”
“Tendra—”
Tendra looked at her husband and shook her head.
Lando continued smoothly, “—or someone else. I'll make sure it's someone with plenty of experience. Nobody's going to be forgotten.”
Han stepped in. “The subsonics pilots are going to be doing more flying than the rest of us. They'll fly several passes in each cavern, driving the animal life in one direction. They'll be notifying mission control when each cavern is done.”
Cheriss raised a hand. “What if the bogeys knock down a subsonics speeder?”
“That's bound to happen,” Leia confirmed. “We have a whole net of sensors set up down there. If any vehicle goes down, it shows as being offline on our computer. We send in a rescue transport. Since the detonators are on mechanical timers we can't abort, we're trying to make sure there's plenty of time between the end of a subsonics run and the scheduled detonation—time to get any stranded pilots out. We're trying to preserve the lives of as many of the animals as we can, but the overriding goal is to save Kessel and keep our pilots alive.”
Wedge offered Lando a slightly malicious smile. “A hundred to one says you weren't able to secure insurance for this little operation.”
“True.” Lando looked regretful. “I knew better. I didn't even try.”
“So if a starfighter goes down and gets blown up, you're paying for it out of pocket, correct?”
Lando's expression went from regretful to mournful. “Dodging the bogeys is better for all of us. I can't stress that enough.”
Tendra leaned forward. “Each of you will be responsible for hitting between twenty and thirty of the munitions devices. In most cases, you'll be targeting a spot near the device and your warhead will not be set to explode on contact. It will go off on timer. Sometimes, though, it will be on impact. We'll try to remember to tell you which is which.”
“Considerate of you,” Hobbie said.
“Also, if one of you goes down,” Lando continued, “that is, one of us goes down, as I'll be doing what you are in Lady Luck, and Han in the Falcon, then the uncompleted targets on your list will be assigned to other pilots—the pilots with the nearest routes. Launch time is still holding at oh six hundred local time tomorrow.”
Though these veteran pilots were twenty, thirty, or forty years older than green recruits, they groaned just like newly commissioned fliers.
Lando offered them a bright smile. “Suffer. I have a toddler.