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“Get the deflector shields up!” Cix told his copilot. “Then plot us a way out of this mess!” He pulled the comm headset on with one hand and enabled it with the other. “I gotta find out the score!”

The ship shook and nearly flipped over onto its back.

“Laser cannon,” the copilot said when he could. “The Givins' resort is history. The Imps are targeting departing ships!”

Cix took his eyes off the communications suite to glance out the viewport. The Desolator was a few degrees to starboard and employing all its forward batteries to make mincemeat of the moon and everything close to it. He threw the ship through a barrel roll and accelerated to port, narrowly evading a stream of destruction.

“We can't jump to lightspeed from this side of the second moon,” the copilot said. “We need to find a way around the battle.”

“Or through it,” Cix said. He whipped the headset off and locked his hands on the control yoke. “Listen for a score!”

A globe of explosive light flared in the distance and washed into the cockpit.

“The space station,” the copilot said. “That'll set the insurgents back some.”

Cix muttered a curse. “I knew I should have taken that bet.”

“Comm from the Hole Card outbound from Yag'Dhul. The militia have destroyed twenty-one Imperial fighters and lost thirty of their own. The remaining Headhunters are jumping to lightspeed.”

Cix turned to him wide-eyed. Subtracting ten from the number of Imperial kills would put the score at twenty to twenty-one, and mean that he had won the bet. “Is that a final?”

“He didn't say. But with insurgent fighters out of play—”

Cix hooted in celebration. With ten deducted to the Imperials, the spread was a guarantee. “Now we just have to survive this.” Nudging the throttle, he sent the Falcon on a corkscrewing course for the second moon; the Desolator was far off to starboard now but several TIEs were taking a keen interest and dropping into the YT's wake.

The copilot gripped the instrument panel as bolts hammered against the rear deflectors. “What are you trying to do, add us to the tally?”

“That's exactly what I don't want to do,” Cix said through clenched teeth. “Just keep your finger away from the laser cannon trigger.”

“Shields are down to sixty percent. Don't take another hit.”

“Easy for you to say.”

Cix changed course, slipping between two inbound TIEs and rolling into a course change.

“Desolator is coming around, aft batteries traversing.” The copilot swallowed hard. “We're not going to make it!” The light-side crescent of the second moon expanded in the viewport. “Even the Falcon's not that fast.”

“You want to bet?”

Cix leveled the ship and maxed the throttle. Energy bolts streaming across the bow and whizzing past both mandibles, the Falcon hurtled forward at bone-jarring speed. Something rattled loose from the bulkhead and crashed on the deck.

“Desolator's got a lock on us. Firing—”

Cix twisted the control yoke, following the cratered sweep of the moon into blazing starlight.

Off the fantail, just to port, two fireballs flashed.

“What was that?”

“Two TIE fighters. Friendly fire from the Desolator.”

Cix blew out his breath. “Close, too close.” He was swiveling toward the navicomputer when the copilot launched a curse at the ceiling.

“The TIEs count!”

Cix whipped around, slack-jawed. “That's impossible! The battle was over!”

The copilot listened for a long moment, his eyes growing dull. “One Headhunter hadn't jumped to hyperspace when the TIEs got hit. The officials are ruling that the battle didn't end until the final insurgent Rebel fighter jumped.”

Cix continued to stare at him. “The TIEs were in play? The TIEs were in play?”

The copilot nodded. “The first TIE kill made for a push, but the second puts us one fighter under the spread!” He blinked. “We lost.”

“Big-time,” Cix said softly. “Big-time.”

“After Yag'Dhul, everyone he had borrowed from was out looking for him,” Doon was telling Han, Leia, and Allana. “Dad saw only one way out: the annual Cloud City Sabacc Tournament. He showed up