Star Wars_ The New Rebellion - Kristine Kathryn Rusch [185]
He climbed into the gunport, slipped on his helmet, and strapped in. Then he grabbed the laser cannon. His crew were shouting all around him. Communications static burst into his headphones but he ignored it.
He had to.
If the Star Destroyer got too close, it would explode the Yavin. The Star Cruisers were more vulnerable than Star Destroyers. More sweet spots, more target areas. And after this much fighting, weakened deflectors. Also, fighting droids made this battle that much harder. Droids were better at precision shooting. That explained why the Tatooine had been destroyed so quickly.
The Calamari showed up on Wedge’s display. It was coming after the Star Destroyer. But it would be too late. The destroyer was shooting now, and all the shots were hitting the shields. They rattled the Yavin, making Wedge glad for his straps.
“Making evasive maneuvers,” Sela said. “Prepare for …”
Wedge pulled off his headphones. He didn’t want to think about command. He shoved aside his targeting computer too. He didn’t have the Force, as Luke did, but he had something else, just as important. Faith in his own abilities. And he was close enough to that destroyer to see his target clearly, something that rarely happened in space.
The red shots looked like a spray of blood coming from the base of the destroyer. They were hitting the shields. He could feel the pattern, knew what they were doing. They were shooting in an ever-narrowing margin, getting closer, and closer, and closer, until all the shots converged into one big one right at the Yavin’s most vulnerable point.
The weak spot in the shields.
It would only take a few moments.
Wedge gripped the laser cannon. He hadn’t fired a shot yet. It felt as if he only had one.
The Star Destroyer’s shots were getting closer together. Near the gunports, people were screaming. The Yavin wouldn’t hold together much longer, but the base of the destroyer was in the wrong position. Wedge kept the cannon pointing at the Star Destroyer’s weakest spot.
The destroyer loomed overhead, filling his entire vision. His hands were sweating on the cannon handles. He kept moving the cannon, waiting, waiting, waiting—
And then it was in position. He held his arms steady, punched the trigger, and watched the single shot fly.
It was long and thin. It soared in the space between the Star Destroyer and the Yavin, red against the destroyer’s scarred white surface. For a moment it looked as if the shot would ricochet off the shields, and then bounce back and forth between the two ships like a ball caught in a narrow corridor.
But it didn’t. It hit the weak spot, which glowed bright red. Wedge grabbed his helmet and shouted into the mouthpiece, “Dive! Dive! Dive!”
The red glow spread and there was a small pop at the first explosion. Then the Yavin dove. Wedge turned his chair so that he could see.
The Star Destroyer exploded: white and red and yellow against the blackness of space. A flower opening, a lightning bolt expanding, a fire starting and ending all in the space of a heartbeat. Beautiful and terrible at the very same time.
No lives lost, though.
He breathed a sigh of relief. The cries in the nearby cabins had grown. There was probably a lot of damage, and they still had the TIE fighters to deal with.
But the worst was over.
This battle was won. But he wondered what was happening with the war.
Fifty-three
Artoo had apparently seen a structural map of this moon. He was leading the droids with some type of purpose. The corridors were sloping upward. The sound of rolling wheels was deafening. One astromech droid was a handful. Hundreds of them were—well—terrifying.
More and more joined the group all the time. Some had scorch marks. Others had dents in their chrome surfaces. Still others had parts hanging out of their sides. They came from side corridors, and each time, another astromech droid would query about the Red Terror. The red gladiator droids hadn’t been seen by any of them except an ancient astromech unit, one that had been old during the Clone