Chapter 35
No Such Thing as Luck
Anakin was the last of the group to enter the dim alley. Adrenaline had numbed his awareness of his sore leg and given him an excess of energy. He didn't even need to pull on the Force to refresh tired muscles for the time being, although he realized he would pay a price later. Recalling the ignominious fainting episode of the day before, he checked the level of his supplemental oxygen. He had used up nearly two-thirds of the canister. Without breaking stride, he replaced it with the spare from the holster he had jury-rigged on his belt.
The alley was unexpectedly level and somewhat wider than the others they had traversed that evening. The only illumination emanated from the vague city-glow behind them and its reflection in the clouds of pollution above. Which was why they did not realize the Force had blessed them until they nearly plowed right into the air truck.
The truck—the open flatbed sort meant for relatively short-distance transportation of heavy equipment or cargo—was parked flush to one wall, leaving only enough space to squeeze past the other wall. Or to open the driver's side door.
No one stopped to discuss possible courses of action. Anakin jumped into the cab, while the clones and Obi-Wan clambered onto the bed. Blaster fire cracked the rear windshield. Anakin threw a quick glance over his shoulder to confirm that the gang had hemmed them in, but Rex and Cody had each taken a knee to hold them off. Even Obi-Wan was firing his pistol. Anakin would have enjoyed seeing his expression of disdain as he did it.
Instead, he tore into the ignition wires, connecting them in a mad rush, until the engine turned over and caught. He threw it into reverse, yelled, "Hang on," and scattered bounty hunters—including Old Tentacles—as he floored the accelerator. Boba Fett, still airborne, buzzed them once they reached the open sky, but backed off in response to a spray of blaster fire from the truck's three passengers.
Anakin gained altitude as rapidly as he dared. Their circuitous path had taken them almost directly across the district from their landing platform. He considered flying back over the district but, given the attention they had already attracted, decided it would be better to keep a somewhat lower profile by sticking to the designated traffic lanes.
Belatedly, he realized their trail had probably been traced back to the shuttle. He shouted out the cracked rear windshield, "Comm Chatter. ETA is four minutes."
Keeping a close eye behind him for pursuit, he circled back to the spaceport by the shortest route possible and descended toward the platform. That port wing really did look mangled from this angle. No wonder it had given him so much difficulty during the landing.
Artoo, surrounded by a phalanx of clones, shepherded the equipment crate that contained their armor and other supplies down the ramp. Dash was limping a bit, but at this point Anakin's group might be in worse shape than he was. Another reason to seek refuge for a few hours—Rex's knife wound needed better attention.
Barely ten seconds after the air truck had pulled up, everyone was aboard. Which was fortunate because that was about how long it took for more bounty hunters to ooze out of the shadows. They exchanged fire with the clones, but Anakin was already pulling away from the platform. "Secure yourselves," he called. "Any way you can."
A quick glance at the dash cam showed half a dozen high altitude speeder bikes already in pursuit. The air was ablaze with red and green bolts, the truck was not built for speed, and evasive maneuvers were severely limited unless Anakin was willing to lose his people over the side.
The truck jolted. Holding it steady, Anakin looked over his shoulder. Boba Fett was now grappling with several of the men on the truck bed. Where had he even come from?
The question was answered by a large air car—filled to capacity by Old Tentacles and his gang—that dropped on their tail. Anakin was fighting to hold a steady course when the truck jolted again, more heavily than ever, and the strain of keeping it level increased by an order of magnitude. An alarm wailed. He spared a glance for the console. Blast. They'd lost a repulsorlift. He checked on his people. It didn't look good. Boba had tangled Hex and Rex in a cable. Dash was slicing them free, but the others were making slow progress in subduing the bounty hunter.
As though they weren't coping with enough complications, another air car joined the pursuit. The only positive development was that its occupants were at least as invested in denying Old Tentacles the capture as they were in catching up to the truck. Half the blaster fire peppering the air was now flying between the rival gangs.
Under the twin handicaps of the pitched battle on the bed and the disabled repulsorlift, the truck was rocking and skipping. It shuddered again. Anakin risked another glance over his shoulder. Obi-Wan was hauling Scratch back up over the side. The situation was getting desperate.
Anakin searched for somewhere to set down that would also give them space to evade their pursuers. Unfortunately, they were still in the upper reaches of the vast port district, weaving among the airborne landing platforms that serviced the larger freighters. There was no point in landing on one of those—they would only be trapped with no escape.
He banked around a particularly large platform where droids were unloading a container ship, hoping to use it as cover to slip down into the more crowded lower levels of the port and the less-expensive, smaller berths. It was at this juncture that the two gangs chose to set aside their rivalry in favor of bringing down the truck. Boba was airborne again and was cooperating with the two groups to force the truck toward a landing platform occupied by a battered, disc-shaped freighter.
Anakin dove at a steeper angle, intending to overshoot the platform and drop beyond it in a bid to gain distance, if not to lose their pursuers entirely. At that moment the truck jolted once more, harder than ever, and alarms shrieked as the remaining rear repulsorlift gave out. The truck, its back end canted toward the platform, lost altitude rapidly.
They were going down and there was no help for it. Anakin pumped the brakes, now hoping only to give his people time to get off.
The sudden alteration to the angle of the truck bed cast the clones and Obi-Wan toward the deck. It was fortunate the dive had left them with little more than a meter to fall. They tucked and rolled away from the truck. With a profane shriek, Artoo fired his booster jets while spraying electricity with his arc welder, apparently just to let off steam as the only thing in range was the doomed truck. The equipment crate dropped to be caught by its own repulsor jets, bouncing on the landing but otherwise unaffected by its precipitous ejection from the vehicle.
The rear end of the truck struck the surface and skidded toward the edge of the platform in a cacophony of screeches and sparks. Anakin threw himself out the door. Although he took care to bend his knees as he landed, the shock traveled painfully up his hips and spine. He ignored the new aches in his legs and rolled into the clear.
The truck tore up durasteel plates in its inexorable slide toward its fate. The exposed innards of the platform sparked and smoked. As the truck reached the corner of the platform, gravity finally overcame the cab's repulsorlifts and they lost their battle to keep the vehicle aloft. The cab hit the rim, tipped forward, and plunged into the chasm below. Amid screeches of stressed metal, the trailing bed wreaked havoc with the support systems that lined the side of the platform.
Boba, wielding two blasters, landed with a jolt. Speeder bikes and air cars closed in fast, their occupants also firing at Anakin's crew, who withdrew to shelter under the slender protection of the freighter's disc. The landing platform had begun to list several degrees.
It shook yet again and sagged even further as a stray shot struck something vital. A series of booming pops emanated from the far end where the truck had taken its death plunge. Whatever that was—most likely a cascading systems failure—this platform would be following the air truck to doom in short order.
A bewildered male voice yelled from behind the ship, "What in the nine hells is going on?"
Anakin barely heard him. "We'll have to take the ship," he called, already shouldering his way to the open boarding ramp. "Hold them off."
The clones had maintained their guard formation around Artoo with his precious cargo of data and equipment and now backed toward the ramp to cover his retreat into the ship.
The ramp led into a passageway that curved with the contour of the hull. Anakin caught a glimpse of the cockpit to the right and rushed toward it. He ignored a muffled, incomprehensible howl from deep within the freighter. He was flipping switches before he had even dropped into the left-hand seat.
What a mess! What fool would connect the reactant injector to the autopilot? He dismissed such irrelevancies in favor of more immediate concerns, such as locating the repulsors. The ship was tilting at a greater than thirty-degree angle now. They needed to be airborne two minutes ago.
"Artoo! The navcomputer is offline. Can you get it up?"
The astromech, who appeared to have abandoned the equipment crate once it was aboard, chirped smugly from the hatch, only to cast profane animadversions on the computer's archaic dialect once he established a link with the ship.
Ignoring him, Anakin continued scanning the instruments. He was not nearly as familiar with Corellian cockpit configuration as he was with galactic standard. It was exactly like the Corellians to lay out the instrument panel according to their own idiosyncrasies just to be contrary. Even so—this wasn't even Corellian standard. Who had wired this disaster?
He still hadn't spotted the repulsors, so he ignited the thrusters instead. The ship bounced up into the air, sending a dark-haired human male careening into the hatch frame. Even before he fully recovered his balance, he aimed his blaster at Anakin. "Out. You have five seconds to get off my ship before I shoot you." He swung the weapon toward Artoo. "You, too, droid."
Attention not flickering from his technological concerto, Anakin condescended to point out the obvious. "Your platform is about to fall out of the sky and those bounty hunters don't mind collateral damage."
"I don't care about the bounty hunters. I care about the idiot hijacking my ship!"
"What exactly are you doing now?" Obi-Wan gasped, appearing behind the captain.
"Getting us a charter," Anakin snapped. "This bucket of bolts is the only option at this point."
"A charter?" the captain spluttered. "This is hijacking, plain and simple."
"Perhaps a softer touch would be in order," Obi-Wan suggested mildly. He tapped the captain on the shoulder. "We are, as you see, in need of a charter to Alderaan. We are happy to pay for your services."
At that moment, the engines ignited with a roar, sending both captain and Obi-Wan staggering again. Several shots splattered against the hull. The cockpit lights flickered.
"I ain't going to Alderaan, and I ain't taking your charter." The captain pointed a demanding finger at Anakin. "Get out of my seat and off my ship."
Anakin hunted and pecked across the instrument panel. "Where in the name of the Great Mother is the deflector shield?"
A heavier shot caused the ship to shudder to the groan of durasteel and ceramics. That blast hadn't come from a hand-held weapon.
Pistol not wavering from Anakin, the pilot leaned over the copilot's chair to flick a lever with a slim brown hand. "My first mate handles shields. Get out of that chair now."
Without lifting his hands from the controls, Anakin twisted his head to stare flatly at the captain for a long moment.
"Really, is this the best approach?" Obi-Wan said with infinite patience. Anakin glanced at him. The reproving look was achingly familiar.
Anakin sighed. "Very well. I will pay you ten thousand for your services, Captain."
"Fifteen."
"That's Trade Federation robbery and you know it. Twelve," Anakin countered. "A premium to compensate for commandeering your ship."
"Fourteen. In advance."
The ship rocked to another impact, although this time it was accompanied by the reassuring hum of energy shields deflecting the shot. Anakin jerked back to the controls. "Do you have weapons on this hunk of junk?"
"Of course I have weapons. And for the last time, pay up or get off my ship."
"Thirteen. That's my final offer. Or I'll have my men restrain you and fly this disaster myself." Anakin turned to glare at him.
The captain's eyes blazed, but he holstered his blaster. "All right. Thirteen."
Another shot thumped home.
"This panel was wired by an idiot. Where are the controls to close the boarding ramp?"
The captain reached around him to slap a button. Anakin's ears popped as the ship's atmosphere sealed. "Get out of my seat."
Anakin set the autopilot before standing. "Plot a course to Alderaan."
"I ain't going anywhere until you pay me."
"Now?" Another blast punctuated his incredulity.
The captain just leveled a flat stare.
Anakin pressed his lips together, but pulled his credit cylinder out of his pocket. "Half now. Half when we reach Alderaan."
The captain grunted his displeasure, but nodded begrudgingly as he checked the readout on his own cylinder. At last he dropped into his seat.
Anakin sat down at the copilot's station.
"No," the captain said implacably. "You ain't flyin' my ship. Not if you were Anakin Skywalker himself. Chewie!" A roar sounded from elsewhere on the ship. The captain turned his own hard gaze on Anakin. "You go tell your people to let my copilot through. And stay out of my cockpit. And take your droid with you. I don't wanna see it talking to the Falcon again."
Obi-Wan had already disappeared down the corridor, presumably following the captain's orders.
Anakin turned to Artoo, who was giving an excellent imitation of being too absorbed in his task to process verbal orders. "Do as he says."
The astromech grumbled but slowly complied, only to be nearly bowled over as a Wookiee charged into the cabin. Startled and off balance, Anakin tripped over one of the passenger seats. He fell awkwardly into the chair. The Wookiee took his place at the copilot station with an irritated roar.
Disconcerted, Anakin grabbed the restraints. Given their antagonistic "negotiations," he didn't quite trust the captain out of his sight, at least until they were in hyperspace on a confirmed route to Alderaan. If his unease had another source, he refused to examine it.
"Yeah, you said it, Chewie, but at least we're gettin' decent pay out of it."
The copilot rumbled what must have been a question.
"Thirteen thousand, and I ain't lookin' a gift traladon in the mouth. That karking droid started the boot-up sequence for the navicomputer. Make sure it didn't screw anything up. And keep an eye on the guy behind us."
The Wookiee's hands danced over the instrument panel. A red bolt grazed past the cockpit canopy. The Wookiee checked a readout and snapped tersely.
"How many ships?" The captain threw them into a zigzag pattern, and Anakin was reluctantly impressed as he somehow evaded most of the red and green cannon bolts flying their way. "You people must be really hot," the captain threw over his shoulder. "What'd you do to rile everybody up like this?"
The copilot made a quiet suggestion.
"No, we'll have to outrun them."
The Wookiee spoke more insistently.
Anakin was beginning to wish he understood the language. It might be the most thought he had ever given Wookiees. A sharp twinge of guilt lanced his gut. He smothered it. No need to rock this barely spaceworthy ship further.
"I know. I know," the pilot grumbled. "Just get me coordinates and confirm she's ready for hyperspace. I'll keep 'em off our tail."
Kenobi returned and seated himself in the other passenger chair. "The seats in the crew cabin are all full," he announced to an unresponsive world. Anakin doubted that was the whole truth. It was more likely Obi-Wan had noticed he hadn't left the cockpit and had returned to keep an eye on him.
Captain and copilot worked in silence for about seventy-five seconds before the first mate growled another complaint.
"Yeah, I'm trying. It's that flux stabilizer." The pilot shot a dirty glance over his shoulder. "Someone interrupted me before I could complete the initialization sequence. It should be up in a minute."
"Just how many systems have you jury-rigged?" Anakin demanded. He ignored Obi-Wan's strangled coughing fit. "Does this derelict even have a working hyperdrive?"
"Stop insulting my ship." The captain twisted around to stab a finger toward him. "For your information, she's the fastest ship in the galaxy—she made the Kessel run in twelve parsecs."
Anakin scoffed. "The only way to reduce the Kessel run to twelve parsecs is to slingshot around the Maw right on the lip of the event horizon. Only a fool would try that."
Kenobi seemed to be having some sudden trouble with his lungs if his smothered distress was anything to go by. He ducked his head and turned away in a not-altogether-successful attempt to muffle his wheezing. Anakin reached out to pat him on the back, but he waved away the concern.
The captain either didn't notice or didn't care about the byplay. "You know, for someone who hijacked my ship, you're skatin' on thin ice, pal." Another shot knocked out the power to an overhead panel. He half-stood to slap it until it flickered back on. "You had a whole moon full of freighters to pick from. Shut up or I'll shoot you out an airlock right now."
"It's not as though we had any choice." Anakin subsided in response to a sharp prod in the arm and a look of reproof from Kenobi, although the force of his expression was somewhat dampened by the tears leaking from the corners of his eyes in the aftermath of his recent respiratory affliction. At least the ghastly wheezing had stopped.
The blackness of space loomed before them with the promise of escape, but for the motley and obviously hastily assembled blockade in the freighter's path.
The captain swore. "First Boba Fett, now Wirrpaun's gang. Well, I ain't doin' that gutless Rodian slime any favors. Especially not with thirteen thousand on the line."
He reached for the comm, but it sounded before he could touch it. "Millennium Falcon, this is the Rancor's Maw. Stand by for escort back to the surface. Joosa the Hutt wants to talk to your passengers."
"In a lizard monkey's ear." The captain dropped his hand back to the console. "Chewie, we're not stopping for that two-bit, second-rate bully. I don't give a hoot if it ticks off Joosa."
Chewie roared with enthusiasm. He pointed at something out of Anakin's line of sight.
The pilot nodded. "I see them. Hold onto your hats," he called over his shoulder. "Now you amateurs will see some real flying."
The ship feinted a drop back to the planet, then with a corkscrew and a flip darted to one side. Wirrpaun's ships moved to intercept. The captain diverted power to the engines, which whined with the strain.
"Chewie, we got a course yet?"
Apparently the answer was unsatisfactory. The panel above his head winked out again. He slapped it with a curse.
Anakin said tightly, "Captain, they're executing a pincer."
"I know. I'm the pilot. How about you let me do the flying?"
Anakin muttered something uncomplimentary under his breath.
The pilot took them through another diving twist. Disoriented and dizzy from the abrupt g-forces, Anakin drew a deep breath, blinking to clear both eyes and head. Reflexively, he checked his oxygen. There was plenty in the canister. A new wave of vertigo washed over him as the ship reversed course into a steep climb. Was this why Obi-Wan complained about being a passenger when he piloted? It was disorienting not to be in control of a ship executing such complex maneuvers.
Without warning, the ship leveled off to burn thrusters for open space, weaving back and forth as it evaded the pursuing cannon fire. Every so often a shot impacted on the shields, but they seemed to hold and the ship lived up to her captain's boast, outrunning the freighters behind her.
The moment they hit the edge of the gravity well, the captain called, "Punch it!"
The Wookiee bellowed.
The whole ship shuddered as the hyperdrive engaged.
Anakin muttered, "And you complain about my piloting?!"