Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order 20_ The Final Prophecy - J. Gregory Keyes [75]
“Jump, Colonel?”
“Yes. I don’t know how secure this channel is, and I’m sure somebody’s paying a lot of attention to us just now. Make the jump and contact your superior there. Tell him it’s all go. Do you understand?”
“Copy. What about you?”
“We’ve got another job to do.”
“Understood,” Jag said.
They were nearly clear to jump when the first of the skips closed to firing distance.
“Okay,” she said. “Let’s give them the distance to jump. Good luck, Four.”
“Copy.” Jag didn’t sound happy. She sighed and switched to a private channel.
“Jag, I need someone I can rely on, someone with command experience. Can you do this, or not?”
“I don’t like it. I don’t like leaving you behind.”
“Then go do your job and hurry back, okay?”
“Yes, Colonel.”
Plasma bursts started whipping past her. “No more time to talk,” she said. “Go.”
She rolled to port and came around. Two skips were following close on Three. She dropped in behind one and started firing, meanwhile jinking to confuse her own pursuer. She hit one of her targets with a torp and flew straight into the expanding mass of plasma and coral. When she couldn’t see anything, she pulled on the stick, arcing up and back—
And dropped in behind her tail. Grimly she got him in her sights. She slipped a few shots through his void defenses, but apparently none hit anything important, because he continued on after Jag and his wingmates, firing constantly.
She had picked up two more on her tail, and her wingmates were busy elsewhere. The X-wing rocked as its shields took a heavy hit, and for a moment she lost the skip in her sights. Cappie squealed.
The skip was going to catch Jag before he jumped.
She fired her last torpedo and escorted it in with stutter-fire. A void appeared and the torp exploded before being sucked in, as it was programmed to do. Her laserfire riddled the skip, which erupted into an expanding ring of ions.
Two more were coming up from the side. She wasn’t going to be able to hold them all back.
Then Jag and his wing were gone.
Take care, Jag, she thought.
She cut hard starboard and under horizon, now more concerned about the skips behind her than any in front. She nearly ran into one she hadn’t seen. He was right in her sights, and she let him have it. The skip didn’t explode, but it rolled off, obviously injured.
“I’ve got you, Twin Leader,” Eight said.
Two explosions behind her, and she was suddenly clear again. The odds were starting to even.
“Form up,” she said. “We have to stay together, or they’ll pick us off.” Nine, in particular, was a long way from the fight. “Nine, that means you, too.”
“Sorry, Colonel. Can’t do anything about it. I’ve lost an engine and my stabilizers are shot.”
“Hang on, then, we’re coming for you.”
But it was only a few seconds later when his X-wing flashed out, struck by fire from three coralskippers.
She watched, feeling hollow and numb. Then she shook it off—they were even more outnumbered now than before, and she realized Wedge had been right. She saw on the longrange scanners that even more skips were coming her way, these slingshoting around the interdictor.
We’ll be lucky if any of us survives.
She no longer felt so bad about leaving the main battle.
She could see the Golan now. It was still a long way away, near the edge of Bilbringi’s wide asteroid belt.
“Let’s take ’em through the rocks, people.”
Moments later, they were dodging asteroids from the size of pebbles to genuine monsters. They forged in deep, and slingshotted skips changed course to follow. Most had the common sense to slow down when they saw where they were going. A few didn’t, and Jaina had the satisfaction of seeing them pulverized against oversized rocks. Strangely, Jaina began to relax—this was what Twin Suns did best, fighter-to-fighter combat in dodgy circumstances. The yammosks handling the big fight had clearly cut these fellows loose to battle on their own. Bad for