• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

“Attention,” the now-familiar alien voice thundered on her comm unit. “Defense forces, stand down. Go to ground at one of the onplanet settlements, and your lives will be spared. Resist and you will be destroyed. Settlement dwellers, remain where you are. Choose peace, not destruction.”

A second voice, a Duros voice, spoke. “Evac ships, vectorrr south. Repeat, vectorrr south. The enemy is coming in from roughly north. Duro Defense Force ships will coverrr any escape shuttle we can.”

Mara adjusted her headset and spoke on the private link. “Luke, where’s Han? What’s keeping him?”

“I’m not getting anything from him.” Luke’s voice sounded strained.

Another battle group appeared, diving toward a second sector of the orbiting arc. The first group’s coralskippers skimmed the first habitat in their vector, blasting away at its defenses. Then the larger ship creature swooped in. It launched something at the city. Mara’s sensors went berserk.

“Dovin basal,” she exclaimed. “A monster.”

Seconds later, that city’s shields flickered out. A dovin basal with that kind of appetite could pull down the city, just like Sernpidal’s moon.

Small craft popped off the other cities like flak-ants. The first wave of attack craft ignored them. A few evac ships winked out, vanishing into hyperspace. The Yuuzhan Vong’s second attack wave caught the lag-behinds. Again, the voice ordered evacuees to go to ground.

Hardly any did.

With the second attack wave came corvette analogs that peppered the cities with asteroid-sized debris. Atmosphere jetted off into space. Here and there something exploded, lighting the city surfaces.

Orr-Om fell faster now, sinking visibly, starting to glow at its edges. Mara blinked. An entire city …

Coralskippers and defenders swarmed Poesy. Now and then its big lasers picked off a coral ship. Mon Cal cruisers’ shields were legendary—almost invincible—but as one of the dovin basal launchers vectored in, and a flight of E-wings tried to divert, Mara guessed even Poesy wouldn’t last long.

Then a third wave of attack ships appeared. If the warmaster meant to show the New Republic exactly how much force he could command, he was doing a fine job. The number of coral ships appalled her, assembling here for their strike at the Core.

And there’d be no help for Duro from Centerpoint or Coruscant.

Disk-shaped Urrdorf gathered momentum, driving obliquely out of orbit. Admiral Wuht had pulled most of his fighters in toward this quadrant, since Urrdorf was the only Duros city with any real chance of survival. Among its defenders, Mara spotted two X-wings.

“Party time,” she muttered, vectoring in to join them.

Jacen heard Jaina calling as he fought the current, trying not to get sucked toward that thundering drain hole. Her presence drew him to the left. Then he saw her by pale violet light, crouching beside a stack of stones, dangling a utility belt’s cable. She flung it. He grabbed it, hooked it to his waist, and braced himself against the current, helping her reel him in.

Then he sank onto the stones, chilled and exhausted, getting his strength back.

Jaina leaned toward Leia, touched her face. “She’s alive,” she murmured, “but barely. Can you go on?”

Jacen’s legs ached as he pressed upright. “Go,” he answered. “I’ll be right behind you.”

She paused to snatch her lightsaber off the wall and thumb her comlink. “Dad, can you read?” No answer. “This way, Jace. I’ll get out where I can transmit.”

Han held his position, waiting. He couldn’t grab for orbit until he heard from—

“Dad!” Jaina’s voice called out of the console. “I’m out, and Jacen’s coming with Mom.”

Han hit the main engines. The freighter soared out of concealment and swooped away from Gateway dome. Glancing down, he counted nine bristly landing ships, an infestation of gigantic seashells near the dome’s north side.

“Go, Droma,” he ordered over the comm. “All shuttles, vector south. We’ll be right behind you.”

Seconds later, the overloaded cargo ship blasted out of its haystack. Beyond the dome, one blocky hauler and a pair of YT-1300s