Star Wars_ Splinter of the Mind's Eye - Alan Dean Foster [43]
The big Yuzzem growled dangerously at him. Luke didn’t let that intimidate him. “I know this whole place stinks. I’d like to blow it to hell and be gone myself, but we’re just a little outnumbered.”
Hin bared sharp canines, grabbed Luke by the neck. Luke stared resolutely at his furry visage. Abruptly, the hand moved away and Hin nodded slowly, giving out with an apologetic grunt.
“Okay then,” Luke sighed. “Go get Kee.” Another bolt broke stone above them and he turned to return the fire. The hallway was starting to fill with Imperial troops. Luke retreated up the hall, called, “Come on, Leia!” Under his covering fire, she ran to join him. Then the two of them covered the alien’s retreat.
As Kee emerged from the communications room, a tremendous explosion shattered the door frame behind him. Smoke and flame gushed from the ruined portal, singeing back fur, but that helped screen them from the massing troops.
Hin had a surprise for Luke and handed it to him expectantly. “My lightsaber! Where’d you find it?” The Yuzzem explained that the soldier who’d appropriated it wouldn’t need it anymore.
Luke refastened the heirloom at his belt as the four of them ran for the front of the building, leaving confusion and blood in equal amounts behind them.…
VII
GRAMMEL rushed into the corridor, several troops at his heels. The Captain-Supervisor finished buckling on his pants and screamed at the assembled mass of troops.
“What the double moons is happening here?”
“Get down, get down, sir!” one of the subofficers yelled frantically to him.
“What for, you idiot!” Grammel roared. “Can’t you see they’re interested in escaping, not in killing you?” Pulling a pistol from its holster, he grabbed at the sergeant next to him. “Get in there,” he instructed the noncom as he gestured toward the communications room with the pistol, “and tell them to secure every exit. No one goes in or out of the complex until I give my personal okay.”
“Yes, Captain-Supervisor!” As the sergeant rushed for the room, Grammel led the by now enormous body of armed troops up the smoking hallway.
Very soon the sergeant exited from the room, shouted after them that communications were out and everyone inside was dead or dying. But Grammel was already out of earshot. The sergeant rushed after him.
Luke threw up a warning hand and the four would-be escapees slowed to a halt. “There’s the exit,” he informed them, pointing around the corner.
Ahead lay double transparent doors leading to the now-attractive damp ground outside. An un-armored soldier sat scribbling at a desk to one side of the doorway.
“They haven’t gotten the alarm here yet,” Luke muttered.
“That won’t last long,” the Princess declared knowingly. “He’s not alone.” She indicated the two guards flanking the exit. Each was armed with assorted devices in addition to a brace of heavy rifles.
Luke leaned against the wall, thinking furiously. It was a long way across an open floor to the doorway.
“We could cover the Yuzzem,” the Princess suggested. “If they can take out the man at the desk before he can sound an alarm …”
“No,” Luke objected. “Too risky. If the two guards are good shots Hin and Kee will both be killed. Maybe if you and I put our weapons down and fake one of us being in trouble …
“Well,” Luke went on thoughtfully, “we could make some noise here, maybe draw one or both of them away from the alarm switches …”
Hin and Kee listened a minute longer to the two humans chattering, then exchanged glances. Hin grunted and Kee nodded in reply.
An ear-splitting shriek made both Luke and Leia jump. Waving their gangly arms and brandishing their rifles like toys, the two Yuzzem went charging around the corner like a hirsute avalanche.
The tactic was unrefined, but it worked. All three guards became momentarily paralyzed by the sight of the two giants bearing down on them. At the desk the uniformed trooper shakily hit two studs … neither of them the right one.
Hin was on the first