Chapter XXI

The Imperial landing craft descended upon the surface of the planet, a few meters from the mangled wreckage of the aft portion of the ship. The pilot whispered a curse as he saw the extent of the damages, surely nobody could have survived that! But somebody had to have activated the distress beacon, there had to be someone alive in that thing. Or at least someone had to be alive four days ago…

Jorec watched as the shuttle landed, hidden behind a piece of wreckage. He signaled to Rinoco, telling him that the ship had landed. He watched as the Stormtroopers began to disembark from the ship, ready to search the wreckage from the Imperial survivors that barely existed. The wounded Imperials, Jorec thought, would be safe from the battle that would likely occur. If they failed, the Imperials would simply find them and take them off of the planet. And if Jorec and Rinoco succeeded in defeating the troops and making it onto the landing craft, the injured would be dropped off at the nearest hospital on the nearest inhabited planet.

He counted the troops as they marched towards the group, there were about ten of them. This was going to be easier than the last battle, Jorec thought. We have a highly defendable location with limited points of entry. They're still out in the open with no cover at all. The only thing they can do when we fire upon them is to either charge for our position, or flee back to their ship. Jorec clutched his blaster pistol in his hand, wishing that they had something other than a blaster pistol and the highly inaccurate E-11's they had "liberated" from the dead guards.

"If only they would have confiscated my Blastech Model 511 hunting rifle," he whispered. He could easily pick off two or three of the oncoming troops now before they even knew he was there. He looked down at his feet, checking his stash of spare energy cells, an E-11, and his lightsaber.

The Stormtroopers were now ¾ of the from the landing craft to the wreckage, approximately ten meters away. Rinoco gave a soft whistle, the signal to begin. Jorec took careful aim at nearest Stormtrooper, focusing his aim near the soldier's knees to account for the recoil, and then pulled the trigger. The energy beam slammed into the chest of the soldier, bringing him down to the ground. Rinoco's first shot also took down another trooper. The Stormtroopers stopped in place, looking for the origin of the shots that had downed two of their own. That gave time for the attackers to line up another shot. Rinoco's next shot completely missed it's target, while Jorec's shot gave a trooper a non-fatal shoulder wound.

The Stormtroopers paced backwards while opening fire towards their attackers, the erratic long-distance fire of the E-11 didn't even pose a threat to Jorec and Rinoco. As Jorec saw their movements, he let out a curse as one of his shots went wide of their targets. The troopers were retreating back to their ship, and then he would be stranded on this planet.

Another trooper went down by Rinoco's fire, making the remaining number of troops at six, nearly half of initial force. Jorec's next shot brought the total down to five. Jorec realized that yet another use of the Force was needed in order to escape this planet, he had to reach the inside of that ship before the Stormtroopers did.

He leapt off of the elevated platform created by the crash that served as his cover, and hit the ground in a Force-assisted landing. The remaining Stormtroopers turned their attention to the gray-clad thing that had just fallen from a great height and was now headed towards them. They opened fire upon the thing, causing a blue blade of energy to emerge from its right arm. The blade intercepted the few shots that got close to it, sending them reflecting back into the air. One blaster shot was redirected into the shoulder of a soldier, sending him down to the ground.

Jorec saw the four remaining Stormtroopers resuming firing upon him, the red blaster bolts streaming past his vision and towards the wreckage. He was close to the group, and with a leap, he soared over the group, flipping over them in order to minimize the target they would have. He landed on his feet about a meter past them, and continued running towards the ship.

He saw the ramp begin to ascend as he reached the halfway point, and his lungs and legs were already burning with exhaustion despite his use of the Force. As the Stormtroopers finally began firing to his back, he pushed himself even harder. Red blaster fire raced behind him, reminding him of when he had escaped the clones that had betrayed him and the other Jedi on Selvernos. The ramp was hanging at a 45-degree angle when Jorec finally reached it twenty seconds after he had begun to race towards it. Another quick jump landed him into the interior of the ship. He brought his lightsaber up, wondering if there were any other troops aboard the ship.

He got back on his feet, exhausted from both the running and the heavy Force use. In his life, he had never drawn on the Force to such a degree, even though a more experienced Force-user would probably find what he had just done easy, Jorec had barely used the Force at all during the eight years of his new life. He strained his ears, listening for any sign of an enemy coming his way.

"Begin lift-off," came a voice to his left.

"What about the troops?" another voice asked.

"With that Jedi out there, they're as good as dead," the first voice replied.

Jorec tried to catch his breath, knowing that trying to sneak up upon the two pilots while breathing heavily would only alert them to his survival, and would ruin his chances.

The copilot of the vessel was readying the ship for take-off when a blue bar of light flashed to life in front of his face. His companion almost jumped out of his chair before a hand came down upon his shoulder.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you!" Jorec spoke to the pilot in an angry voice. "One false move and your friend gets it, and then you," he bluffed.

The pilot settled down in his chair, while the copilot squirmed, hoping that he would survive the next few minutes.

"Now, tell the search-and-rescue team out there to surrender," Jorec commanded the pilot. "And no funny business."

The pilot nodded and slowly reached for the communications station. "Alpha Team, this is Kirwood, stand down and surrender immediately. I repeat, surrender immediately!"

From behind his cover, Rinoco watched as the Stormtroopers stood around in confusion after Jorec had jumped over them. The four Stormtroopers had stopped firing, and after what seemed to be a few minutes, removed the energy cells from their rifles and threw the two parts separate ways.

"Very good," Jorec said to the pilot, his lightsaber still near the copilot but no longer at his throat. "Now, take off and land between the troops and the wreckage. Don't you try anything funny," he added.

Twenty minutes later, Rinoco led the last of the surrendering troops into the cargo hold of the ship, the entire vessel's supply of stuncuffs around their wrists. The wounded were allowed into the first aid bay, where the medical droids began to heal them.

"You know how to pilot this thing?" Jorec asked the Xexto rebel as he entered the cockpit of the ship.

"I'm not familiar with this exact model, but I have flown several other space transports," Rinoco replied. "Where exactly do you want to go? Alderaan?" Rinoco asked, remembering the dying words of Banth.

"No," Jorec replied. "Selvernos. We need to go to Selvernos."