Star Wars_ The Han Solo Adventures - Brian Daley [81]
Remembering the barrage the Authority people could lay down in the narrow stairwell, he knew that the price would be terrible. Doc did, too, and pushed himself off looking, for the first time, like the very tired old man he finally felt himself to be.
“Don’t stop for anything,” Han was telling the others. “If somebody falls, somebody else grabs his machinery, but nobody stops.”
He caught Chewbacca’s eye. The Wookiee peeled back his lips from his curved fangs, scrunching his black nose, and sounded a savage, appalling howl, shaking his shaggy head—a Wookiee’s way of defying death. Then he grinned and rumbled at Han, who smiled lopsidedly. They were close enough friends not to have to make any more of it than that.
XI
MORE inmates had come up to the landing, but they were unarmed. Han repeated instructions about weapons and not stopping. His heart pounded when he thought how concentrated the energy beams would be in that stairwell. Goodbye, Old Spacemen’s Home.
He rose to a half crouch, and the others emulated him. “Chewie and me first, to lay down a cover. On three; one, two”—he edged to the corner—“th—”
A small, furry form, vaulting over those behind Han, landed on his shoulders, tugging at his neck. Its limber tail looped out to encircle the surprised Chewbacca’s wrist.
Han staggered, valor forgotten. “What the flying—” He identified his assailant. “Pakka!”
The cub swung down from Hans’s neck, bouncing up and down urgently, tugging at his leg. For a moment no fact seemed reliable. “Pakka, didn’t you, I mean where’s Atuarre? Dammit, kid, how’d you get here?” He remembered then that the cub couldn’t answer.
Doc was shouting from below. “Solo, get down here!”
“Sit on things here; don’t charge and don’t fall back unless you have to,” Han told Chewbacca. He pressed through his troops and raced down the stairs, trailing the fleet Pakka. Inside the emergency door leading to the tier blocks, he slid to a halt. “Atuarre!”
She was surrounded by Doc and the other prisoners. “Solo-Captain!” She seized his hands, her words tumbling out on top of one another. She’d brought in the Millennium Falcon and clamped onto the cargo lock here at the tier-block level, on the opposite side of the tower from the Espo assault ship.
“I don’t think they noticed me; energy fluxes in Stars’ End are distorting sensors completely. I had to link up purely by visual tracking.”
Han drew Doc and Atuarre aside. “We could never, never fit all these people into the Falcon, not if we use every cubic centimeter of space. How do we tell them?”
The Trianii broke in. “Solo-Captain, shut up! Please. And listen: I have a tunnel-tube junction station secured to the Falcon. I drove it right up against the ship and made it fast with a tractor beam.”
“We can certainly fit inmates in the tunnel-tubes if we extend them,” Doc began.
Hans’s excited voice overbore him. “We’ll do better than that. Atuarre, you’re a genius! But will the tunnel-tube reach?”
“It should.”
Doc was looking from one to the other. “What are you two—Oh! I see!” He rubbed his hands together, eyes bright. “This will be novel, for a fact.”
One of the defenders from the upper landing poked his head through the emergency door. “Solo, the Viceprex is calling for you again.”
“If I don’t answer, he’ll know something’s doing. I’ll send Chewie down to help you. Work fast!”
“Solo-Captain, we have only minutes remaining!”
He bounded up the stairs, though it left him huffing and heaving, and threatened to black him out. Air’s going, he thought. In hushed tones he explained everything quickly and dispatched the Wookiee and most of the others down to join Atuarre and Doc.
Then he answered Hirken. The Viceprex shouted, “Time’s short, Solo. Will you yield?”
“Yield?” Han sputtered, unbelieving. “What d’you have in mind, defloration?” He pegged a shot around the corner, beginning a steady harassing