chris063: Thanks...I worked really hard on the Corran scenes...I'm glad you liked it so much.
RowenaR: I tend to write action the least...I'm much more interested in character development, emotion, etc. That's actually why I like the pilots - there's so much more room for character development
Alhana-Antilles: You don't get much attention to the battle of Hoth other than from Luke and Leia's point of views in the movies...and it's easy to forget that other people were there, and that they went through as much as - if not more - than Luke did. Glad you liked those lines. I liked them, too. Wes is one of my favorites.
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Summary: Rogue Squadron heads back to Hoth to defend an Intelligence Unit. But they get more than they bargained for.
Disclaimer: Star Wars, Rogue Squadron, and the rest are not mine. I write this for my own amusement. Jesina is my own, original creation.
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Chapter 22: Sacrifice
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Having decided that Horn had come back to his senses enough – for the moment anyway – Kyp told him how to get back to his fighter and then headed off to find his own way back to Hoth. He'd been around long enough to know where to find a shuttle, and just hoped that the squadron of Uglies was out on patrol. He'd gotten in good with this crew – an Imperial offshoot in over their heads – about a month ago, but he doubted that the goodwill would still exist if they'd come back and been unable to get in touch with the rest of their group.
He kept a minimal mental connection with Horn as he went, and could feel the emotions warring back and forth within the man. Anger, helplessness, guilt…they were all sentiments he was intimately familiar with from his own fall to the Dark Side. He relived them every day. Every day he thought about Luke or Han, or Horn, for that matter. Or Zeth.
Kyp pushed the thoughts aside, shunting away the emotional pain with great difficulty. He needed to keep it together and get off this rock – Horn's sanity depended on it. Not that he was looking forward to dealing with Antilles, or anyone else, for that matter, when they reached Hoth.
Still maintaining his connection with Horn, he reached the corridor he was looking for. Slowly, he extended his Force sense to cover the hangar. And froze.
The squadron that he'd hoped was still out in the field…wasn't. They were in there. And they seemed to be waiting for him.
He thought back to how he'd found Horn, and the men on the ground. How many had been there? Two against the wall, one…two…three with blaster wounds, another against the wall, and the one he'd been electrocuting. Seven. But there were eight.
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Jesina yanked the stick hard, for the first time in her life afraid that she might actually break it. The ship turned sideways, sending her passengers, strapped in though most of them had been, tumbling into each other. But even that maneuver wasn't enough to get them out of the asteroid's trajectory. The starboard corner of the cockpit slammed into the surface of the asteroid, sending the Nightwind cartwheeling off into space.
She could hear Tycho hailing her over the comm, but responding to him was the least of her concerns as the freighter was battered by debris broken off in their collision only moments earlier. She fought to get the vehicle under control and, though her heart refused to believe it, her mind wondered if it wasn't a losing battle.
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Kyp thought for a moment. They were a full squadron…twelve men. They'd have been no match for him and Horn together, and he knew if he let himself go he'd have no trouble getting off this Force-forsaken rock. But with Horn so close to the edge right now, he was hesitant to risk using any excessive use of the Force, even if he had no intention of harming anyone.
He flattened himself against the wall. He didn't have much choice, no matter how much he wanted to avoid it. He'd just have to rely on it as little as possible. Drawing his lightsaber but leaving it unlit, he let himself sink slightly into the Force. Summoning it, he put the image into the men's minds of him standing over their late comrades – and mentally urged them to go after him, that they might save their leaders. Then he watched as seven men – half the squad plus the sole surviving ringleader – ran by him, never once looking in his direction.
Good. Only six more. That I can handle, even without the Force. He was skilled enough with a lightsaber that he was confident he could make it through this with only negligible use of the Force. Extending the beam, he stepped into the doorway, drawing their attention in an instant.
He had only seconds to take in their positions before the blaster bolts started to fly.
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Tycho watched helplessly as the Nightwind went spiraling away from them. There was nothing he could do but put faith in Jesina's piloting skills. She was as good as any one of them in a fighter and better than Wedge was in a freighter like that.
He tried contacting her, but got no response. He told himself it was just that she was focusing on keeping them alive, but wasn't being very successful in convincing himself.
"Seven?" he heard Myn's tentative voice.
"Yeah?"
"Is there anything…?"
"Wait."
Then he heard Wes cut in. "Praying wouldn't hurt either."
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Corran climbed shakily into his cockpit. He wanted nothing more than to retreat into himself and avoid any and all sentient contact – human or otherwise. But he knew that the others wouldn't allow it. Durron certainly wouldn't, and he didn't foresee Wedge letting him languish in his own regrets.
He greeted his astromech and was surprised that the little droid could tell so quickly that something was wrong. "Just get us back," he murmured wearily, and received a peeved blat in reply. He couldn't blame him. Whistler might as well have been a member of his family…Mirax even charged the droid with looking after him when they were apart.
Shifting power to the repulsorlifts, he lifted off the asteroid with relative ease, and then locked his S-foils in cruise position. He set a course for Hoth, but refused Whistler's offer to take over. Not only was an asteroid field less than conducive to autopilot, but he needed to do something – anything – that was even remotely constructive.
He did have the droid map him the fastest route out of the belt, though. He might have felt like flying on his own, but he had no desire to get killed doing it.
Despite the focus he needed in order to make it out of the belt, his mind did wander. Mirax. What would she say if she were told – when she were told – what he'd done? For that matter, what about Iella? She'd kill him for risking everything to try to save her. He could hear the words in his mind. I got into this knowing what could happen. You could have cost more lives than just one. It wasn't worth it. It's never worth that kind of sacrifice. The words played over and over again, like a holo message set on repeat.
And what would Luke say? There was only so much he could say…he'd made the same mistake, as had many of his students. He'd understand, and offer his compassion…and then I'll get angry at him for placating me.
Corran sighed and pounded his hands on the console in frustration. All he could think about was the disappointment he knew he'd see in every face he looked at, hear in every voice that spoke to him.
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Jesina groaned as her head connected soundly with the center panel. She managed to stay in her seat – she'd have to remember to write to the company that manufactured such a sturdy harness. She braced herself – feet planted wide apart and both hands on the stick, arms locked. She tried to straighten out, but knew she couldn't do much until the craft lost momentum. All she could really do was wait it out and try to keep the spiral from getting any worse. And pray that no more large rocks came out of nowhere.
As the vehicle slowly began to slow, she barked out, "Everyone okay back there? What's the damage? Can someone hit the comm so he stops yelling at me?" and got, she figured, about fifteen responses back at once. A neat trick since there were only six of them on board, and one was comatose. "One at a time, now."
"Well, I don't think that ride did Iella much good," Malat replied. "And the rest of us might have minor – ouch!" she interrupted herself as she slammed against a cabinet once more, "concussions," she muttered, "and cuts and bruises, but we'll be okay."
Jesina glanced quickly to her right as Tekha slid into the copilot's seat – the seat she'd been occupying until all the fun started. "Night seven, we're all right. We'll have a damage report momentarily." The Rodian glanced over his shoulder at Tera and gave her a pointed look.
The woman tossed a glare in his direction. "Give me a second." She ran a finger down a screen. "Shields are gone, hull breaches in the storage units – nothing to worry about right now. Front end is pretty well smashed in. Port engine is history – that probably helped slow us down." She paused. "Um…hyperdrive motivator's gone. Lot of surface damage."
She dropped onto a seat. "All in all…could be worse. Most of the damage is superficial – that sensor package is going to be expensive to replace, though. And I'm amazed the comm still works. There are a lot of other little things, but we'll make it back in one piece. So long as we don't do that again, at least."
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Most of the bolts missed Kyp – by a good meter or two. One grazed his shoulder but didn't even break his concentration, and the rest he easily deflected as he moved steadily toward the nearest shuttle. He really didn't want to kill them. Not that they didn't deserve to die, but he just didn't want to if he didn't have to. Especially considering the apparent theme of the day. So he took a gamble and, still holding his lightsaber in his right hand, raised his left. As he moved his hand toward the rock ceiling, one of the men rose too.
"Now, you can let me leave and I'll put him down gently, or you can keep fighting me and I drop him. Probably on one of you. What's it going to be?" He used the Force to project his voice, sounding more intimidating than he otherwise would have. Intimidating was good in situations like this. He tapped his foot and lifted the man a little higher, and then, when he got no response, reached out with the Force and picked a second one up of the ground.
One by one, they lowered their blasters and raised their hands. With the Force, he sent the weapons skittering across the floor and far out of their reach. Then, having reached the shuttle, he slowly lowered his hostages to the floor and disappeared inside. The men, too shocked by the display to speak, never made a move to stop him.
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"You sure you can make it?" Tycho asked, his words heavy with concern.
"We can make it. We're almost to the edge of the belt, and as long as we don't get any visitors, we'll be all right. If we do…well…my weapons systems are destined for the scrap heap, so you better stay close by," Jesina replied.
Tycho nodded to himself. "All right. Anything else goes wrong, you find any problems that you didn't notice before, let me know immediately. We'll work something out."
"I copy. Nightwind out."