CHAPTER
THIRTY-THREE

Jaina Solo rolled her X-wing to port and leveled out for a ground-attack strafing run. Sparky switched her targeting controls over to ground-attack mode, which superimposed a targeting grid over her view of the ground. On the secondary monitor the sensors calculated the number of life signs found in each square of the grid and then colored those squares. The brightest colors meant they had the highest concentrations of life. The heads-up display likewise added these colors to the grid it displayed, but in muted tones so the pilot could still see the ground.

Jaina ruddered her X-wing around and hit the flicker trigger for the lasers. Hundreds of laser splinters shot through the night, lancing down toward the Yuuzhan Vong soldiers climbing up out of the pit the proton torpedoes had created. Some of the splinters hit nothing, others ricocheted into the air after touching armor, but most stabbed through reptoids, killing them instantly.

She pulled up, trying to climb her X-wing above the sensation of life-forms dying, but their pain and despair clung to her like mud to a boot. She detested having to slaughter so many individuals, but she also knew she had no choice. These reptoids were coming on in good order, and from the chaos that marked the refugee camp, either she killed the reptoids on the ground or they’d kill the refugees. And my mother and brothers and Danni …

Gavin’s voice crackled as it came through the comm unit. “Rogues, we have a new assignment. The freighters are lifting off. We have them outbound.” His voice faltered for a moment. “Each one of you picks up a freighter. Assignments coming now.”

Jaina saw that she’d been attached to the Impervious, which she didn’t mind, but it was the sixth ship in the convoy. “Sparky, give me a rundown on which Rogues are still operational!”

The droid came back with a grim report. Colonel Darklighter and Captain Nevil were all that were left of One flight. Two flight had been reduced to Major Forge. Three flight had fared better, with Major Varth, Jaina, and her wing mate, Anni Capstan, still alive, but the squadron as a whole had been cut in half. Savage Squadron was down to one flight, and the Toughs … They’re all gone … We swept the skies of the skips, but at a great cost.

Jaina keyed her comm. “Do we have outbound coordinates, Colonel?”

“Solution in progress, Sticks.”

She shook her head. The reason they had come to Dantooine was because they had too many people to travel a long distance in hyperspace. They had no supplies. Either we found supplies or … She glanced at the backlit bodies strewn around the camp beneath the freighters lifting off.

A lump rose in her throat. I hope none … She almost reached out with the Force to try to find her mother or brothers or uncle, but she focused herself instead on dropping her ship in on the shuttle’s port wing and pulling for stars. I have a mission to perform here before I worry about my family.

“Sparky, have you received those coordinates?”

The little droid tootled as it downloaded the navigational information. Jaina’s X-wing and shuttle cleared the Dantooine atmosphere before any of the other ships and moved into a high orbit around the world. The other ships followed them, lining up perfectly in an orbit that would take them from pole to pole around Dantooine.

Sparky whistled and fed the solution to Jaina’s secondary monitor.

“Agamar! Just where we wanted to head anyway. And the outbound vector is coming up just on the other side of the pole …”

The droid shrilled, and Jaina looked out her viewport. Coming up over the edge of Dantooine’s disk, sitting in the outbound vector for Agamar, was a Yuuzhan Vong cruiser. Jaina couldn’t be certain that it was the one they’d already damaged, but some of the spines were broken. Worse yet, as the secondary monitor showed, the cruiser was again employing its dovin basals to create a gravitic anomaly strong enough to prevent any ship from making the jump to hyperspace.

“This is Rogue Eleven. We have a Yuuzhan Vong cruiser acting as an Interdictor again. We’re going nowhere.”

In the shuttle’s cockpit, Leia stood between the seats her brother and Elegos occupied. “Jaina’s right, that will stop us from traveling away from here.”

In the distance red-gold plasma bolts started flying lazily toward the convoy. All the shots passed high. The intent of the gunners seemed clearly to be to herd the ships back down to Dantooine. Where the ground troops can finish us.

Luke winced and pulled himself up in the seat. “I don’t know how much I can do, Leia.”

She patted Luke on the shoulder. “You may not have to do it alone, Luke.” Leia keyed the comm unit. “Colonel Darklighter, what do the Rogues have left in the way of proton torpedoes?”

“We have one left, Highness. We’ll drop it in on the cruiser if you want. We can take our fighters in and strafe. Perhaps that will be enough to pull the interdiction field off.”

Leia shook her head as Elegos pointed to new sensor traces coming up. “Negative, Rogue Leader. We have new coralskipper traces on sensor. The cruiser is launching fighters. Looks like they really do want us back down there.”

“We’ll convince them otherwise.”

She shivered. “It feels to me as if Dubrillion and this fight here have all been an exercise. The Yuuzhan Vong have been learning. This Interdictor tactic is something they didn’t do in the first attack on Dubrillion. They want to herd us back down there to test us again. If we try to run, we die up here. If we don’t, we die down there. Either way we’re dead.”

Luke shook his head. “That’s not certain.”

Leia frowned. “How can you say that?” She gasped, then covered her mouth with a hand. “You have a vision in the Force?”

“Glimmerings.”

The sensor console beeped. Elegos glanced at it, then cocked his head to the left. “Something coming out of hyperspace. Something big.”

The reversion to realspace for the Ralroost occurred several seconds sooner than Admiral Kre’fey had intended. In the instant the white tunnel through which his ship had been traveling began to fall apart he knew at least one Yuuzhan Vong cruiser had made itself into an Interdictor. The only reason for this could be to prevent the escape of the ships that had been grounded there. Which means I’ve arrived right in time.

He glanced over at his weapons-control officer. “Tell the Corusca Fire to let go with everything they have. Fire for effect what we have, as well.”

The black Bothan weapons-control officer snarled orders into a comm unit. Golden streaks of turbolaser fire flashed out at the Yuuzhan Vong cruiser. Blue bolts of ion cannon beams lanced down. A tremor ran through the Ralroost as the twenty proton torpedo launchers on board spat out their deadly missiles.

The Corusca Fire, which was an old Victory-class Star Destroyer, likewise launched all the concussion missiles it had available. Eighty rockets spiraled in at the Yuuzhan Vong cruiser, with each target evenly spaced around the enemy ship so no one void could capture more than one missile.

The gravitic anomaly that had dragged the New Republic ships prematurely from hyperspace evaporated as the dovin basals broke off to stop the incoming missiles and laser fire. Whether because the assault just overwhelmed the available dovin basals, or the creatures had exhausted themselves creating the interdiction field, they failed to intercept all the lasers and missiles. Proton torpedoes pulverized yorik coral hull panels. Turbolasers melted plasma spines and scored long furrows in the ship’s hull. More than one spine broke off and floated free in space.

The Yuuzhan Vong cruiser fired back with its plasma cannons. Red-gold gouts of energy slammed into the Ralroost’s shields, nibbling away at them. The golden energy coating faded, and drained away 20 percent of the shields’ power as it did so, but the shields still held.

But if we have to slug it out with them, they won’t hold for long. The idea of those plasma blasts getting through to melt his ship’s hull sent a trickle of fear through Kre’fey’s guts. If there is no other way, however, to get the freighters out of here …

The sensor officer glanced at the admiral. “Sir, the Yuuzhan Vong cruiser is pulling back. Its skips are diving for atmosphere.”

A round of cheers greeted the news, but Kre’fey cut it off with a slash of his hand. “Communications, get me the Impervious.”

“On-line, Admiral.”

“This is Admiral Kre’fey. Senator, are you still in charge of my shuttle?”

“I am, Admiral. Would you like it back now?”

“I would, yes. Please bring it aboard and have your fighters recover through my dorsal recovery bay. The freighters can form up on us, and we will escort you away from here.” Kre’fey smiled. “Provided your fact-finding mission is over.”

“For now it is, Admiral.” The Caamasi sighed. “And the senate is not going to like this report at all.”

“That hardly surprises me, Senator.” The Bothan admiral’s violet eyes narrowed. “And it’s all the more reason we make for Coruscant as fast as we can.”