Star Wars_ Fate of the Jedi 04_ Backlash - Aaron Allston [57]
Nor did Jaina let go of it then. She maintained her mental grip on the net and yanked it through one of the holes in the wall. That Mando went flying, and the one who’d cast the net, still attached to it by a line, was hauled off his feet. He went flying after his comrade, the sudden lateral movement causing him to drop his blaster rifle.
Three left, but the other two were unhurt and would be back in a moment—perhaps with reinforcements.
The three were on their feet now. One turned away from Jaina, facing back down the corridor, and threw up his arm just in time to catch Tyria’s descending lightsaber blade on it. The beskar from which his crushgaunt was made withstood the impact of the green energy blade, and he was not wounded. But the crushgaunt was scarred and the sheer force of Tyria’s blow drove him back a step.
Jaina spun between the other two, chambering her weapon, ready to kick. One of the two Mandos, a female, wore a rocket pack and ignited it, carrying her up and away from Jaina. That was all right; she was not Jaina’s original target. Jaina leapt, and her kick took the other commando in the side of the head. It was certainly not powerful enough to damage the beskar, but a lot of kinetic force was transmitted through the helmet, rocking the man’s head. He staggered away.
Tyria’s lightsaber found an unarmored chink in her opponent’s plating. She drove the blade, point-first, into his inner thigh. He made a strangled noise, took two jerky steps backward, and fell as the smell of burned flesh joined that of explosives residue. But another commando, the one who’d launched the net at Jaina, leapt out from the hole in the wall and swung at Tyria before she could react. His gauntleted fist took her in the jaw. Jaina heard the crack, saw the jaw deform, and suddenly Tyria was down, unconscious. The odds abruptly went from two against five to one against four. Or three and a half, if the concussion she was sure she’d given one Mando counted for anything.
There was a new boom from farther down the corridor, back toward Apprentice Geffer and the turbolifts. Jaina nodded, comprehending. Another handful of Mandos would be leaving the StealthX hangar the same way these had, using explosives to bypass doors, moving laterally in directions the Jedi wouldn’t normally prepare for.
Now the only thing between this second unit of Mandos and the turbolifts was one apprentice. She saw Geffer’s desk slide through the intersection, picking up speed, propelled by the boy’s use of the Force, and a split second after it vanished from sight down the cross-hall she heard it destroyed by mini rockets. Apprentice Geffer, grimly determined and frightened all at once, stepped out into the intersection, his lightsaber lit.
Jaina swore to herself. She could not retreat to help Geffer. She had to hold here or they’d both be flanked. But the apprentice was no match for experienced Mandos, especially Mandos who had clearly trained and prepared for conflict with Jedi. She had to hope he’d last a few seconds.
The flying Mando female fired down at Jaina with a blaster pistol. Jaina sidestepped the barrage of shots, making it look clumsy when in fact it wasn’t, and launched herself at the commando who had taken Tyria out.
The turbolift door opened and Raynar Thul stepped out into the passageway. He saw an apprentice, lightsaber glowing blue in his hand, facing down a side corridor. Down the main corridor, Jaina Solo was squared off against three Mandos, one of them flying. Correction, four Mandos: another one, casting off ruins of a net, charged out through a hole that used to be a doorway.
Raynar strode forward, told the apprentice, “I’ll take this,” and turned toward the apprentice’s subject of attention.
Subjects. Five more Mandos moving forward through the ruins of some furniture and what once had been sections of wall. They hesitated when they saw him.
For once, people seeing him were not hesitating in the face