Star Wars_ I, Jedi - Michael A. Stackpole [135]
Just one proton torpedo and you’d pay for that arrogance, Tavira. I glanced over at Keevy, but he’d not moved. “Problem, Keevy?”
He blinked and shivered. “No, sorry.”
“You can use the navicomp?”
“Yeah, sure.” He started punching buttons. “Where to?”
“Short hop out to the edge of the system, then double back across it. From there we head out.” I frowned and thought for a second. “Get us into the Quence Sector, Elshandruu Pica. I have friends there.”
“Okay. Courses being plotted now.”
My console beeped and I saw the gangway had been retracted. “Keevy, hit the green button over there.”
He looked up and punched the button that released our docking claws and retracted them. “Done.”
“Good. On your right, the inertial compensation unit. For the cockpit, dial it back to .95. For the passengers, keep it at full.” I glanced around. “We have to have shields here somewhere, don’t we?”
Keevy smiled. “Over here, I’ve got them. Hey, these are Chepat Supreme Defender models. Very nice.”
“I hope we don’t need them.” I punched the ignition switch, powering up the main drive unit, and shunted power to the repulsorlift coils. I hit the button for the ship’s intercom and tried to keep my voice light. “We’re on our way. Sit tight and you shouldn’t feel a thing.”
I hit a button on the comm unit to try to make a call for help, but a hideous screeching filled the headset’s earpieces. “They’re jamming the comm channels.” I snapped the comm unit’s jamming filter on, which killed the screech.
Keevy’s eyes widened. “We can’t summon help.”
“Nope, we’re really on our own.” Of course, if help was close enough to summon, Tavira would be out of here very fast. The fact that she’s actually here means there’s no rescue coming.
Annissya came into the cockpit and strapped herself into the jumpseat I’d been offered earlier. “Everyone is seated and braced.”
“Okay.” I took a moment, concentrated, then nodded. “Keevy, first heading.”
“Course two two three, angle three one five.”
“I copy. Power to shields.”
“Shields full.”
“Annissya, can you hit the scan-recorder? I want to pull in as much data as I can while we head out.”
I settled my hands on the steering yoke and stared out at the Invidious. “Here we go.”
I nudged the throttle forward and pulled back on the yoke, lifting the nose. As it came up and the Palette slipped away beneath us, I hit the switch to lower the wings and lock them into place. I knew that if our raising the shields had not alerted the Invidious to the fact that something was wrong, lowering our wings certainly would. A glance at my tactical screen showed three Tri-fighters breaking off a patrol and beginning to vector in on us.
The wings locked down, so I shoved the throttle to full, then pitched the ship forward into a dive.
Our comm unit crackled as the jamming faded on the emergency comm frequency. “Shuttle Tinta Blue, this is the Invidious. Stop now and we won’t destroy you.”
Keevy stared at me, horrified. “Shouldn’t you say something to them?”
I nodded toward the comm headset at Keevy’s side. “You talk to them.”
“Me?”
“I’m busy here.” I rolled the shuttle and pulled back on the yoke, curling us up and out away from our dive. An old Corellian corvette had moved to block our course, and filled space around us with ruby shafts of light. I saw two blue ion bolts shoot past, so I hit the etheric rudder and rolled to starboard, breaking us off the glide path we’d been on. I broke back to port again with a snaproll, pulled the nose up for a second, then jammed the yoke forward again.
This left us with the Invidious filling our viewscreens. The ship’s heavy turbolasers turned inward, trying to shoot at us, but we’d gotten in close enough that the side-mounted guns had trouble tracking us. Better yet, the light show they created in trying to shoot us had caused the clutches to break off for a moment.
Keevy donned the headset. “This is Tinta Blue Seven,