PERFECT STRANGERS: PART XIII

Dedicated to Adam Kirby for helping me with my one and only battle scene. 

Still on a high from his exchange with Jaina's, Brock ascended into the atmosphere. But by the time he reached the edge of the planet, battle was already raging. Brock flew in immediately and sniped a TIE off Jeremy's tail. Brock grinned at his best friend's exclamation over the comm.

"Stang, it's good to see you, Mitch!"

"It's great to see you guys too. Echo One is back online!" The squad responded with a war cry. Brock grinned at their enthusiasm and scanned the horizon.

"You guys handle the pack—" he finished. "But I've got a personal vendetta with the leader."

Nicolas gazed at the starlines from a corner of the deck. They were racing toward destiny. TIE fighters were hovering above Yavin, perhaps fighting already, and the Artemis crew was on their way to finish the job. Nicolas took a deep breath as Taurus announced that they were dropping out of hyperspace. He knew that there was no way out of this fight alive. But strangely enough, panic gave way to an emotion that he had not felt in seven years. A shadow of peace shrouded him and flooded his entire being. He walked steadily toward the main deck of the bridge.

Brock relaxed his left hand as his lasers zeroed in on Tristan's tri-fighter. He could not risk letting her escape. The smaller and more agile fighter gave Brock the fight of his life. Every shot he took found only the cold vacuum of space as home. It was like she knew where he was going to fire before he did. Still, he pursued her while keeping a listening ear on the rest of his squad.

Suddenly, the unmistakable wedge shape of the Artemis dropped out of hyperspace with lasers firing. Brock rolled to avoid the majority of the flack, but kept a watchful eye on his target. But the moment he swung his ship around to chase her again, Tristan's fighter exploded in a brilliant flash of light.

The crew of the Artemis was in an uproar and Nicolas' eyes shined in the blaze that was now Tristan's fighter. Moments ago she had been the greatest Admiral in the history of the Artemis. Now she was gone; engulfed in a storm of focused coherent light. Nicolas' reverie had been broken by Taurus' fist smashing into his face. Two other commanding officers dragged him to a chair on the deck and bound his hands and feet. If they survived this fight, he would be spaced shortly after. But Nicolas relaxed; it was all over. She was gone.

Brock gasped, stunned and slightly disappointed. "That was my shot!" he cursed under his breath.

"Mitchie, you alright?" Lucy cut in over his comm.

"That Destroyer just blew their own Admiral, Luce. She's gone!"

"You're kidding!"

" No! That shot was mine—and they're gonna pay with their lives."

"Mitch, are you crazy! They'll kill you!"

"I know what I'm doin', Lucy." he answered, whipping his ship around and charging back into the fight.

As he dodged other fighters, Brock realized that the best counterattack would be to graze the bottom of the ship in an effort to pull all of the fire back toward the Destroyer. At such a close range the targeting computers in the gunners' helmets shouldn't work, which would buy Brock some time to work on a way out of the fatal situation.

Brock aimed the nose of his ship directly at the Artemis. His training took control as the bow of the Destroyer zipped past. In one move, he swung his fighter parallel with the Destroyer.

Punching the throttle to full, he zipped past countless turrets. At full speed, he quickly reached the end of the ship, then cut his engines and pulled the nose away from the ship. To minimize the turn, he gunned his engines halfway through and prepared for the return journey down the length of the Destroyer. But before he could start back, three enemy fighters spotted him and closed in.

The TIE's were much swifter than Brock's x-wing. They quickly circled him, trying to catch him in their cross fire. "Oh, but it's not that easy." Brock thought as he centered the nose of his x-wing on the fighter in front of him. Maybe he could get them to back off by making an example out of one.

Brock screamed towards the TIE, in a high-speed game of chicken. The TIE pilot realized what was happening and prepared to clear out of the way of the much heavier craft and its obviously insane pilot. But Brock was determined.

"Oh no, not today, sweetheart."

As the space between the fighters diminished, Brock switched all of his shields to forward and barrel rolled into the solar panel couplings. The impact caused one wing of the TIE to separate from the cockpit and sent the wreckage spiraling into the atmosphere of Yavin.

"Yeah, that's what I thought." Brock mumbled triumphantly under his breath. But as he spun to face the last two fighters, the landing bays of the Artemis opened like the jaws of a rancor and released another lethal battery of TIE fighters. Clouds of enemy ships poured from the bays and prepared to finish off the evasive fighter.

Brock cursed under his breath, spun his ship and fled with lasers firing. In a heartbeat the fighters were locked onto him and firing back with all they had. A quick jerk to the left or the right was all that kept Brock from becoming space dust. With nowhere to go but straight ahead, Brock zipped through the flack, clipping the wings of two more TIE's. With his heart in his throat, he pulled up at the last possible second and zoomed into the landing bay of the Destroyer, which sealed shut seconds behind him.

"Lucky, where's Mitch?"

"I just saw him." Lucy answered as she blasted another TIE. "I think he's up by that Destroyer. He's got a death wish today and no one's convincing him otherwise." Jeremy's voice was frantic.

"Mitchell, where the hell are you, man?"

Brock's vocal cords were frozen. He was trapped inside the Destroyer and unless he went through with this stunt, he'd be dead in minutes. Navigating the narrow corridor was no walk in the park and within sixty seconds, Brock had crunched the nose of his fighter against two empty TIE's. He would have to abandon his ship and fly out in an enemy fighter.

"No time, no time," He mumbled, fumbling with his safety restraints. He quickly loaded and armed both torpedo cannons on his kamikaze x-wing hoping to cause some damage on his way out. He didn't realize that this would not be a problem since he had crashed less than thirty feet from the Destroyer's ammunition hold.

He heard the heavy hangar bay door lock and then a clatter of metal against metal. One, perhaps two more ships had followed him in at the last possible second. Brock threw his entire weight against the jammed canopy of his x-wing and made a break for the closest TIE fighter, blaster in hand.

The air was thick with the explosions and the Destroyer wobbled as ship after ship exploded against it's exterior. The enemy fighters within the structure were shooting blind and their fire grazed Brock's body on more than one occasion. In mid-sprint, Brock turned and saw the majority of the shots sinking into his abandoned fighter. His eyes widened in terror at the reality of what was about to happen. Clambering into the nearest TIE, Brock quickly studied the unfamiliar starboard. They used to have a model of one at the Academy, but that was forever ago. He hadn't seen one in years.

Nevertheless, he fired up the engine and found a couple of the ammunition triggers in a matter of seconds. When he finally removed the ship from the wall of the Destroyer, the enemy fighters were upon him. Brock swallowed hard, realizing that even if he managed to get out alive, his own team would be targeting him.

The enemy ships stopped at the sight of him, unsure of whose side he was on. Brock took advantage of the opportunity and turned his fire on them. He managed to take out the first one rather quickly. The small blast weakened the structure of the landing bay. But the bay corridor was no place for multiple fighters and by the time Brock made it over the first damaged fighter, his TIE was partially crushed. Adrenaline racing, Brock pressed forward with lasers firing and slammed all of his shields to the front to charge the second fighter. However, he realized a little too late that this TIE was not as sturdy as his x-wing. He barely cleared the second ship and by the time he did, a double explosion rocked the entire Destroyer. The smaller one, created by the second TIE fighter slamming into the remains of the first blew a small hole in the side of the landing bay, and the second one quickly flared into a blaze that threatened to destroy the whole ship.

Brock's life flashed before him as he tried to cram his wounded fighter through the wall of the ship. "This is it!" he realized audibly. "It's over!"

Slightly barbecued by the orange fire cloud at his back, Brock's partially dismembered fighter hurtled wing-over-wing toward Yavin's atmosphere. Brock fought for control of the ship, amazed that his mind was relatively clear. His thoughts were focused not so much on landing, but on the fact that the last promise he'd ever made to Jaina was about to be broken.