A/N Part I: Okay, I hereby decide that I will place further A/N at the bottom of the text because they begin to contain spoilers and just seem to be placed there better generally. But on with the story.

Chapter Twelve

It was the still of hyperspace that Coreena found its most important quality. While she traveled through the whirling colors she could let her mind wander even more easily than in her cramped quarters or in the buzzing activity of the canteen. She allowed herself to close her eyes for a brief moment and leaned back. By chance her thoughts drifted to her talk with Zifra and satisfied she thought, one thing to scratch of my list. Which still left the nightmares, the strange sensations and occasional visions she kept having and that damn thing with her XO, which strangely enough bugged her the most since their last encounter.

After her last failed relationship she had sworn herself never to fall in love again with any pilot, squad mate or not, if they served together even only on the same ship. How could she have been so stupid as to fall for a comrade? From her first day as a soldier she had known that there was nothing more painful and stupid than falling in love with someone you saw every day, worked with, passed your down time with, could not escape if this one didn't return your feelings the way you wanted it. But no, it had to be her CO, in all galaxies, who was happily married to a member of his ground crew… She shook her head to get off these painful memories… all of them, together with some rather unpleasant encounters with fellow male pilots or ship personnel… She starred out of her canopy front window again…

And suddenly the psychedelic patterns of hyperspace vanished and were replaced by the blackness of deep space and the quiet was torn by blaring collision alarms and her frantically shrieking R2. In an instant the squadron channel was alive with all of the pilots chattering at once.

"Leader, Two, I have fast ships incoming…"

"My R2-unit keeps warbling about a gravitation field but we are in the middle of nowhere…"

"There's something on my HUD…"

"It's a drag ship!"

Trying to stay as calm as possible Coreena looked at her won HUD and sensors and could see at least 24 red blips approaching them very fast as much as a bigger red blip approximately six to eight klicks behind her. She turned her ship in a lazy arc and when the ship which Randy had called a drag ship came in sight she held her breath for a heart beat. It had the triangular shape of an Imperial Star Destroyer but where its hull should have had a sleek appearance, two big bulbs on every side were pricking through it. An Interdictor Cruiser. "Damn.", she muttered and instantly began to making decisions. "Okay, let's stay close to the transport an rescue as much of them as we can manage. Concentrate your fire on the attacking fighters and try to stay away from the Interdictor. And most of all: Try to get away from its mass shadow. My R2 will calculate a micro-jump and then try to send it to your units on a relatively safe frequency. Protect the freighters, don't do anything foolish, jump as soon as you are away far enough from the Interdictor. Good luck to all of you."

With the captain's last words the first wave of TIE-fighters hit them full force. They were attacking the convoy in the usual three-to-one-odds, everywhere it was possible. Since Kenzy and Blenwell where the guardians of Bantha V, the last one of the freighters and therefore the last to have jumped they were now the ones at the front, the ones that engaged the TIE-fighters at their full strength.

"Seven, hard to port on my mark… Now!" While she was breaking starboard to evade the first wave, Blenwell did the same to starboard and flew a tight arc. They had wedged three TIE-fighters between them and were fighting them now from two sided, eventually eliminating all three of them. Their X-Wings crossed paths and flew tight maneuvers to keep to the slow transporter. Saron inwardly cursed the limited maneuvering space the tight formation of the transports caused, but aloud she said: "Bantha V, Eleven, how are you doing?" The reply came crackled but still clear enough to tell her that they were taking a fair amount of fire but would be able to hold on for at least 30 minutes. She checked her own systems and found her shields reduced to 85%. Not critical yet but still a fact to worry about. Her droid warbled. It ad received the data from Mallan's unit together with the entry vector. Five clicks to go. "Bantha V, did you receive everything, too?" They acknowledged and instantly corrected their course according to the data. To Saron's eyes the movements of the heavy freighter seemed painfully slow.

"I wish they would just dump that damn cargo and hurry out of here." She sighed at Blenwell's remark and returned: "You know that was stupid and uncalled for, Seven. Better keep your senses on that fighters, as I got one on my tail I absolutely can't shake." She let her X-Wing dance to all directions and ankles, making it hard for the TIE-fighter pilot to target her. Or so, she hoped.

She couldn't suppress a sigh of relief when Blenwell finally vaped the eyeball. "What, don't I even get a thank you?", came the cocky reply of her wing-mate. She wondered briefly how it was possible that someone could concentrate on fighting and keeping up his reputation of a pain in the ass, but replied nothing, only rather concentrated on defending her assigned transport.

Then, suddenly a scream broke through her battle haze, and she realized only marginally that the green dot representing Gray Five had vanished from her sensor boards. The part that noticed such things and immediately began to digest them emotionally normally shrunk through a program just running in the background during fights, but she knew it would come back to haunt her all the harder after everything was over. But now was not the time to think about things like this. They had almost reached the entry spot and were relatively clear of any hostile forces when suddenly two fighters seemed to run at her from above her. They began to pump lasers into her shield and since she had cut down their energy to a fourth of their maximal strength to gain more speed they were down to zero in only minutes. LASERS OUT, the text on her display read and now she really was in trouble. "Seven, where are you? My lasers are out…" TORPEDO LAUNCHER OUT. And still the fighters kept pursuing her. Suddenly she felt a sharp pinch at her right leg and her right and felt like it had been fried in hot oil for several minutes. UPPER PORT ENGINE OUT. "Make… jump…", she got out and hoped Blenwell would understand her and leave with the transport, but he just replied: "Not until I have blown up these clowns."

His fighter zoomed past her front window and red laser beams penetrated space. To her relief a bright red explosion enfolded to her port side. She tried to follow Blenwell at least with her gaze but found it alarmingly impossible to move her body without even the slightest feel of pain. There were not many situations where Saron Kenzy would start to panic but this was definitely one of them. She had never felt so helpless and useless as when Blenwell finally exclaimed, that he had gotten the last one. With all her remaining strength she pulled the lever. And then there was only black nothingness.

When Kal told her hat the first transport had escaped Coreena heaved a sigh of relief. At least two would survive this ambush. Up to now they had lost two transporters and one squad member. She just hoped it would stay this way. Both she and Marcus had put a up a tough fight, constantly reducing the waves of TIE-fighters coming towards them but they were everything else than close to the entry spot. Her transport, Bantha I, didn't look the best either and she could see no way to get through the fight without severe damage as Bantha I was placed in the center of the convoy and since there were only two transporters remaining, the fighter wing leader seemed to render Bantha I as the most important transporter. If Imperials were after food and food processor spare parts he certainly was right.

She took a quick scan of her surroundings. Frowning she realized that the bigger part of her squadron still was at the fighting scene and first decided to order the ones that didn't have a transport to defend anymore out. But as she inquired Bantha IV's flight status she was told that they had lost both their main engines, a part of their life-support system and had taken some hull damage already but that their hyper drive and hyper drive motivator were still operational. She let out a curse. Bantha IV was their most important transport along with Bantha V since it carried X- and Y-Wing spare parts as well as astromech units, starfighter fuel and – what was most important – a considerable big shipment of bacta. A part of this was more or less safely away but the bacta still was there and her plan to simply escape had obviously failed. Grudgingly she had to take on plan B.

"Grays, this is Leader. Change of plans. We have to take out this Interdictor. I will definitely go. An volunteers to join me?" The light to her left side blinked, indicating Marcus wanted to speak to her over their wing-pair frequency in private and although she knew almost exactly what he wanted to tell her, she switched it on. "You sure you want to do this, Cap? I mean… it's an Interdictor…" Yuck. His "worried-friend"-trick again. "Yes, positively, Two. You stay here with the squadron while I take on this thing. Any questions?" By now he knew this tone and knew to keep his mouth shut.

She switched to squadron frequency again and said: "Well, any volunteers?" Static hissing, then: "Leader, this is Three. I'll go." Coreena acknowledged and right after Deraani and to her surprise Flann called: "Leader, Nine. Me, too."

"Okay, let's go. Three, Nine, form up behind me, we're gonna fight our way through to the Interdictor." Three and Nine acknowledged and followed suit. Again her comm-light blinked. Sighing she changed the frequency again and heard Marcus saying in a very low voice: "Be careful, Cap." For a moment she considered not answering and simply changing the channel, but then she decided otherwise and replied in a voice equally low: "Sure, Marcus.", then switched over to the frequency she had assigned to "suicide flight" as she sardonically chose to call their little assault party. "Let's get the party started."

Marcus cast one last at Coreena's fighter, then returned his full concentration to the TIE-fighter dancing before him. Which was a blink of an eye to late. The fighter broke hard to port, to fast even for an X-Wing. Marcus tried to follow it nonetheless but heard his inertial dampers whine in protest. He aborted the action and assigned the target to his wing-mate, which was now Randy Krennel. The kid was quite good here, better than he had been in all situations before. Marcus just hoped it would get him through this, too.

He went through the locks on his HUD and finally found what he was looking for. Bantha IV's shields were finally down to zero. Time to do a check-up. "Bantha IV, how are you looking?" He got only a static hissing as an answer but it was answer enough. Hurry up, Coreena, dammit, hurry up! By now, only six TIE-fighters remained but they seemed to be made of tough meat. Bantha IV was hung in space like a lame hawk bat, ready to be taken by a bigger predator. It was a tough decision but he chose to concentrate his actions on the fighters attacking Bantha IV instead of I. I had their shields at 50%. A part of his mind which wasn't fully involved with fighting found it quite odd. As if the fighter pilots knew full well which freighters were the important ones… He shook his head, chased the thought away, tried to concentrate on the fight again.

"Bantha V to Gray fighters. Everything okay with you?" Marten waited for Kenzy to reply but nothing came. He circled her fighter and finally got a clear view inside her cockpit. The sight scared him. Her head hung loosely forward, her face not visible. She was very clearly unconscious. Damn. It was his fault. He should have seen the fighter attacking her. He should have seen that her shields were rapidly decreasing. He should have… "Hey, you alive or what?"

He closed is eyes briefly and shook his head. Then he responded: "Bantha V, this is Gray Seven. I'm okay, but my wing-mate seems quite battered. Her life stats say she's still breathing and has a pulse but she quite positively needs some treating. I'll try talk to her R2." He changed the frequency and said: "Whatever your name is… what's your ship's status?" I'D RATHER WORRY ABOUT ITS PILOT, replied the droid. Marten grumbled: "You didn't have much memory vapes recently, did you?" Another reply appeared on his screen. MY MISTRESS TREATS ME WITH RESPECT. Good Jedi, I'm arguing with a droid…"Um… okay… don't let's turn this into a moral dispute.. just tell me how the ship is and how Kenzy is." Finally the droid was willing to cooperate. I AM REPAIRING THE ENGINE AT THE MOMENT SINCE IT SEEMED TO ME TO BE OF GREATEST IMPORTANCE. THE LASERS AND TORPEDO LAUNCHERS ARE STILL OUT. MY MISTRESS IS UNCONSCIOUS BUT HAS PULSE AND IS BREATHING. AS FAR AS MY SENSORS TELL ME SHE HAS SEVERE BURNS ON HER RIGHT SIDE. Marten took some time to think. The needed to get Kenzy as fast as possible into medical care but someone needed to fly her ship while she was unable to do it… "Bantha V, do you have vacuum proof suits and someone on board who has some experience with the X-Wing?"

The Bantha had bacta on board, and would be able to treat her a little but his hopes fell as the captain gave him two negatives. And he told him: "Hey look, space jockey, we need to get away from here. We have some difficulties with our life support systems which need to be repaired real soon and we have some injured also. It would be nice of you to decide a little quicker." He wanted to rub his eyes but knocked his hands against his visor. Grumbling again he addressed the droid: "Are you able to perform basic flight maneuvers on your own?" The droid's answer came fast and he was sure that if he had actually be ale to hear the droid the answer would be a furious warble. Amused he read the text. OF COURSE. MY MISTRESS USED TO TRAIN ME. I MAY BE NOT VERY GOOD IN FIGHTING BUT I SURELY KNOW HOW TO FLY THIS SHIP. Marten nodded and then said: "Okay, I tell you what to do. Try to wake up your mistress, she needs to stay awake if any difficulties appear. Calculate the jump to the safe world and try to land that thing there. And by no means let her sleep again, she might have a concussion." There was no reply, but soon afterwards he could see Kenzy moving her head up very, very slow and trying to coordinate the movements of her hand. Minutes, it seemed, later her slurring voice came over the comm, saying: "How dare you waking me up? Bastard, you…" He smiled. Maybe she had a concussion but even that didn't do anything to diminish her energy when it came to flaming on him. "Just stay awake 'till your droid land you safely. We will jump when Bantha has the coordinates calculated. By the way, are you ready, Bantha?"

The answer came almost instantly. "Yeah, sure, space jock. Ready as any freighter can be. Let's get away from here."

At the same moment the rest of Gray Squadron still was fighting but luckily only two TIE-fighters were there and there didn't seem to come any new ones. Soon they had finished them too, and Marcus was ready to help Coreena and the others with Interdictor as they still had their difficulties with it. But just as he was about to turn towards them, Coreena's voice came over comm, sounding strained but under control. "Don't even think about it. Guard that freighters. You can never be sure what they will throw us." He heaved a sigh and did the only thing he could do. Sit and watch.

Coreena on the other hand had her hands full. Not only were the gunners extremely good shooters but they also had had a squadron of TIE-Fighters in stock which they only had released when Coreena and her two companions had crossed an invisible line some half click before actually being in torpedo shooting range. They couldn't even think about coordinating a torpedo attack against the Fearless because they all had at least two eyeballs on their tails and were chasing one. She cursed. If they couldn't soon get rid of this ship they would begin to board the freighters as they had already dispatched landing boats. She told Marcus and hoped he just knew what to do.

He did, but it wasn't what she had wanted him to do. Finally deciding against her order he dispatched Randy and Nunb from his party and sent them over to Coreena. Maybe she'd hate him after this but at least he could say of himself that he had done everything in his mind to safer her life and the lives of their fellow pilots. He knew he couldn't stand his ground against landing boats with only him and Kara defending the freighters but if they were lucky enough they didn't need any defense at all. It were only seconds after this that his sensors showed the first landing crafts.

"Gray Four and Ten to the rescue, Leader." He had done it again. Coreena cursed and answered in a tone none of them had heard before: "Four and Ten, Leader acknowledged. Get these eyeballs off our tails." Without answer they obeyed. Coreena didn't know how long she had done this, fighting eyeballs, trying to escape the Fearless' gunners, desperately hoping for a chance to do the final torp run. She had to admit that the two new fighters were an improvement but Marcus would have to justify this when they had made it out of this. That is, if we make it out of here., she added mentally but didn't dwell on the thought too long. There were definitely other things to do.

The fighter in front of her bopped from one side to another and she tried to concentrate solely on it. And she eventually succeeded when the tunnel vision set in. Everything else diminished and she entered the kind of trance she seldom achieved. She couldn't explain it but suddenly somehow everything else vanished and she was able to evade the laser beams of the Fearless unconsciously. Then something inside her tinted, like a string of a Alderaanian harp being pulled carelessly like it always felt when she tipped into something deep inside of her. And in the blink of a moment the TIE-fighter vanished from the battle field. As much as three others in close order.

She only half noticed what was going on outside her mind and the strange trance she was in. When she heard a distress call over comm she realized only moments after it that it came from Randy. She was divided. If she talked she was secure to lose her concentration but if she did not he would most probably do something foolish. Her decision was made in a split second.

"Go back, Four. Try to make it to the exit vector. Take Ten with you. Your object is to get out of here alive. Am I understood?" It took some seconds, then came his strained and almost not understandable answer: "Yes… good luck, cap…" She breathed a sigh of relief as two of her fighters withdrew immediately. Now it was up to her, Deraani and Flann again.

She raced alongside Fearless' port hull and let a series of shoots pour down on it. Then something big exploded and from what she knew about Imperial standard starship engineering it was some sensor array. If you can't defeat your enemy, confuse him. Or make him blind, deaf and mute. It showed some success as suddenly a whole line of cannons grew silent as they didn't know where to shoot anymore. This was their chance. If they didn't strike now, they'd as well do it never.

"Peeps, we're doing it now. Form up behind me, link your target computers to mine and pray for a last time." At her order, Three and Nine aborted their respective runs and did as she ordered. When they were ready, the trio left the hull and made their way to the two towers next to the bridge and targeted the two spheres above them which were the shield generators. But just as she was about to order the first volley, Deraani reported a torpedo launchers' malfunction. Coreena couldn't do anything than to order her out and she did. She just hoped it were only Deraani's torp launchers which didn't work properly.

"Okay, Nine. On my mark. Three…, Two…, One… Fire!" Both hit the trigger and four torpedoes successfully hit the first generator. But both of them also knew that they had o destroy the second one as well if they wanted to destroy the Interdictor. "Ready, Nine?" He gave her an affirmative and they did their second successful run. And when the generator finally exploded and the ship began its death spin it was time for them to run.

Marcus' R2-unit Siren let out its typical whining sound when the ship's sensors finally showed no mass shadow anymore. He could see Coreena's and Flann's ships coming at him on the highest speed their battered ships could offer and her voice pierced in his eyes when she shouted over comm: "To all Alliance vessels, jump!"

He would have done it but a millisecond before pulling the lever suddenly a gunboat raced down to her, attacking her violently while another boat took on Flann. They both stood their ground but it pained Marcus to leave her like his, to abandon her. Form the corner of is eye he saw that the three of them were the only Alliance ships remaining. He was at a relatively safe position far enough away from the thread the gun boats were posing but he just wanted to do anything. His attempts however were stopped before he even had begun them.

"When I say jump, I mean it, so for the Stars' sake do it!", her voice came over he comm in the same commanding voice she always was successful with and it worked with him, too. Casting a last look, he finally jumped to hyperspace.

A/N: Cliffie!!!!!!! I always wanted to do it and now it's here!!!!! I hope it doesn't vex you this much, though… anyway… okay, I admit it… no big revelations here, I had to save this for the next chapter (which will be a "talk"-chapter again… I just don't like writing too much dog-fight scenes because I'm just not very good at them), but at least some allusions and the action I promised was in here, as much as a new death. I hope he didn't have any fans out there who desperately wanted to stay him alive… ahem *g And… maybe someone of you noticed the slight change of style mostly in the last part… I owe this to Jane Austen whose books I'm reading at the moment ("Pride and Prejudice" – it's the book… I absolutely adore Jane Austen's style and stories) and whom I'm naming my muse after (who gave me some brilliant ideas when I least expected them…), mostly because of the stated reasons and – now listen, folks, this is just great – Jane Austen began as a fanfiction writer herself. Everyone not willing to believe it… read the editorial in the Penguin Popular Classics 1994 edition. Or ask me to quote it in the next A/N *g Anyway… meet Jane, my muse… Jane, say hi to the ff.net readers… "Hi to the ff.net readers." Yeah, very funny, kid…