Star Wars_ X-Wing 02_ Wedge's Gamble - Michael A. Stackpole [22]
It took him four shots to do what she had done in one, but the effect was no less spectacular. The scarlet laser bolts burned a line of holes in the Interceptor’s canted port wing. It began to tear away from the front and smashed into the ball cockpit. When the top half of the stabilizer finally ripped free, the port wing twisted. The Interceptor began to gyrate and spin, then shook itself apart. Finally the twin ion engines exploded, one after the other, sowing ship shards on the Mrisst atmosphere.
The second squint kept coming and Corran’s maneuver had left him presenting his profile to it. Whistler whooped a warning, but Corran felt no panic at all. He rolled the ship over onto its top, then hit more left rudder. This reversed the effects of his previous move and left him going nose-to-nose with the squint. Corran centered the Imp in his targeting cross and when it went green, he tightened up on the trigger.
The laser bolts perforated the cockpit and filled it with fire. A secondary explosion shredded the squint. The wings sailed away from the fiery red and blue ball, then the ion engines blew, engulfing the remains of the ship in a silvery cloud. It imploded and tiny bits of debris struck sparks from Corran’s shields, but did no damage.
On ahead Corran spotted Vengeance because of the sheer volume of laser fire coming from its bow and waist lasers. The green darts formed striated cones of fire that spiraled around as the gunners attempted to hit their targets. While the freighter’s guns had not been intended as antifighter weapons, the tight spirals meant the gunners were having a very difficult time tracking their targets.
Apparently Lieutenant Cracken can fly very well.
Corran saw four pairs of proton torpedoes head in at the waspy freighter from widely disparate angles. Even if the gunners had been good enough to actually shoot the torpedoes out of the void, covering all the shots would have been difficult. Some shots were going to get through, the only question remaining was how many.
All the torpedoes hit, bringing down Vengeance’s forward and aft shields amid a storm of brilliant explosions. Vengeance began to rotate in space, exposing a gaping hole in the port side. Escape pods shot out in all directions. The freighter continued to move away from Mrisst, but it was clearly drifting and would eventually succumb to the planet’s gravitational pull.
“Nine, break starboard.”
Corran rolled his ship to the right hard, but still caught a couple of green laser bolts on his aft shield. He shunted power from his lasers to the shields, then evened their strength out. Back where he had been, a TIE starfighter swooped through a dive, and one of the squadron’s X-wing’s flashed past, hot on its tail.
“I can’t shake this squint on me.”
“Twelve is on the way, Eight.”
Erisi has one on her and Captain Nunb is on her way to help. Corran saw two TIE starfighters streak down and past him, coming in on an oddly angled vector. He wondered what they were doing until Whistler put a track up on his screen that showed them to be on an intercept for Rogue Seven, the ship that had called for him to break. Her target is pulling through a tight loop and she’s following, while the two garrals try to cut across the circle and nail Rhysati. Not if I can help it
“Seven, watch your aft. I’m coming, but be prepared to break up and right if I call.”
“I copy, Nine. Almost have him.”
Corran rolled the ship to port, then hit enough rudder to stand the X-wing on its nose. He punched the throttle full forward and angled in at the two fighters following Rhysati’s ship. He switched his targeting system over to proton torpedoes, but didn’t target the TIEs immediately. Some models