Star Wars_ The New Jedi Order_ Dark Tide 01_ Onslaught - Michael A. Stackpole [109]
Off to the right Colonel Bril’nilim gave a signal, and the freighters began opening up. Elegos’s shuttle rose and hovered in a forward position, with the fire from its laser cannons and blaster cannons pulsing out scarlet energy projectiles that warmed the night as they passed. The shipfire burned furrows through the Yuuzhan Vong ranks, thinning them, but not nearly enough. In the backlight of distant explosions or the burning of corpses, Luke could see the Yuuzhan Vong troops had come even closer.
When the Yuuzhan Vong soldiers reached the two-hundred-meter mark, the troopers started shooting. Their blaster fire came slowly, cautiously, fired without a hint of panic. Red bolts lanced out, striking silhouettes. Some of the Yuuzhan Vong troops spun before falling. Others just collapsed, and yet others sighed and sat, then flopped over as if exhausted and retiring for the day.
At a hundred meters the Yuuzhan Vong troops began to run forward, so the troopers’ firing became more hurried. They still struck their targets, but gaps in the lines filled immediately as the wave of Yuuzhan Vong soldiers rushed ever closer. Smaller and stockier than the Yuuzhan Vong warriors Luke had fought, these troops looked reptilian, like Trandoshans but more compact. They did sprout a pair of calcifications from their foreheads, more domes than horns, and Luke suspected it was through these that the Yuuzhan Vong controlled them.
The large vehicles began pulsing plasma out toward the breastworks. Shots pounded into the ground, shaking it, pitching dirt and debris into the air. Shots that fell short plowed through the mass of Yuuzhan Vong troops. Those shots that were on target splashed against shuttle shields or the fortifications. In the latter case the shots blasted the fortifications apart, scattering troopers and, worse yet, opening gaps in the line that allowed the Yuuzhan Vong troops to pour into the compound.
Luke sprinted to the nearest gap and ignited his lightsaber. The green blade hissed and spat as he cut right and left, chopping down the reptilian troopers. The Yuuzhan Vong troops were armed with small amphistaffs, which froze themselves into a sharpened hook shape that clutched at arms and legs, cutting as the soldiers drew the amphistaffs back. The lightsaber couldn’t slice through the amphistaffs, but the troops were too slow to prevent Luke from lopping off limbs or stabbing through chests.
Because he could feel the slave troops through the Force, killing them proved far too easy. He knew where they would be, what they wanted to do. A parry here and a stroke to the head, or a block, then a riposte to the heart. He wasn’t fighting troops as much as he was battling for time. If killing each one took three seconds or five, he couldn’t possibly stop them all. Meter by meter he was being driven back by the sheer weight of the assault, and even with the Force to strengthen him, he couldn’t kill them fast enough.
Unless I can think of something to do, it’s over, it’s all over.
Leia ran to the center of the camp and immediately appropriated a blaster carbine from one of the refugees standing guard. She found Danni and pulled the woman aside, then waved Lando over. “I need your help.”
“You’re bleeding,” Lando said.
“It’s nothing, for the moment anyway. I need you to use the Force. You can feel emotions, right?”
Danni nodded stiffly. “I’ve been trying to shut things out. They’re all afraid here.” She glanced down. “Like me.”
“Look, there may be Yuuzhan Vong among them, using ooglith masquers to pretend to be people. We have to find them.”
Danni blinked and raised a hand to cover her mouth. “Yuuzhan Vong here, hidden here?”
Leia grabbed the young woman’s left shoulder. “Steady yourself, Danni. You can do