Star Wars_ X-Wing 05_ Wraith Squadron - Aaron Allston [109]
Her voice turned scornful. “Don’t ‘Please’ me, Lieutenant. If someone said, ‘Please live’ to you, you’d just ignore him or spit in his eye.”
“That’s crazy.” The pilots ahead of him were moments from entering the pass between the volcanoes. The pressure increased, squeezing his chest so hard he didn’t think his heart could beat.
“No, it’s not. You don’t care enough about yourself to live. So you don’t give a damn about us.”
“You’re wrong. Turn back.”
“Swear it.”
“I swear it! Turn back!”
The canopy of his X-wing went black and the roar of his engines died. A white slit appeared where his canopy should rise, but when it did come up, it opened on a port-side hinge rather than on a hinge behind him.
Sweating, trembling, he stared into the faces of Face, Tyria, Falynn, and Kell. They wore headsets and somber expressions.
The pressure in Donos’s chest snapped. It became a ball of pure rage. He lunged at the faces before him but was restrained by his pilot’s harness. “You bastards—”
All but Kell pulled away. Kell merely pulled his headset off and handed it back to Face.
Donos got his harness off, stood in his pilot’s seat, and leaped at Kell. The force of his leap, the force of his anger, should have taken the big man off his feet, but Kell pivoted, caught Donos’s right arm, and spun Donos down to the flooring almost gently. The walls of Night Caller’s lounge, their colors chosen by scientists to be soothing, twirled around him as Kell manhandled him.
But Kell didn’t pin him. From his kneeling position, Donos took a swing at the big man’s groin. Kell got a hand in the way, angled the blow to the side, and took it on his thigh.
“I’ll kill you.” The force of his scream scoured Donos’s throat raw. “How could you do that to me, put me through that again—”
Kell didn’t speak. He was concentrating on Donos’s movements, which made Donos even more furious. It was Tyria who answered: “What choice did you leave us? You were just lying there. Trying to die.”
“That’s my right!” Donos stood and threw his best punch at Kell’s face. Kell managed to get his hand behind Donos’s elbow, shoving Donos off balance. Then Kell turned away as if to leave, completed the spin, and Donos felt his legs being kicked out from under him. He slammed down onto the hard floor of the lounge.
“You don’t have the right,” Kell said. “Do you remember swearing an oath?”
“Shut up!” Donos kicked out at Kell, but the other man anticipated the move and drew back a pace. Donos’s boot fell short and rang on the lounge floor.
Kell continued, merciless: “Do you have the right to mourn a droid so deeply that you don’t give a damn about Jesmin Ackbar dying?”
“Shiner …” Suddenly all the fight left Donos. Grief so strong it was like a physical thing, like a hole in his body, bent him double.
He became aware that Tyria was bending over him, shaking him. “Myn, don’t go away. We need you here. We need you flying. We need you watching our backs. We’re your squad now.”
“Shiner …”
“What is it about that droid?” Her voice was at once worried and angry. He looked up at her, saw her incomprehension.
“The last …”
“The last what?” She stared down into his eyes, then she looked startled. “The last Talon. He was the last Talon, wasn’t he?”
Unable to speak, Donos nodded.
“And as long as he was still … alive, you hadn’t let them all down, had you, Myn? You hadn’t failed the whole squadron? You still had him to protect.”
Donos spoke around his grief. It made his words thick. He himself would barely have understood if he weren’t speaking. “He’s gone now.”
“Myn …” Tyria looked lost, desperate. “We need you to protect us now. We’re your friends.”
“Don’t want friends. Friends die.”
“Dammit!” She pulled him to her so his head was in her lap. He stared up at her, hoping she’d stop speaking soon so he could go back to sleep. “Myn, I agree with you. When I joined the Alliance, that was my motto. Friends die, so don’t make any. Just go out,