The crucial moment was past. Maybe Jaina had misinterpreted the situation when she reached out to her mother in the Force, or maybe something had delayed the Falcon. It hardly mattered. The battle could no longer be stopped. Zekk was descending out of the jungle’s defoliated canopy with her StealthX slaved to his, and all that remained now was to spring UnuThul’s trap and watch the Chiss die.
As the StealthXs drew near, Jaina and Zekk’s mind-link was restored. It was not as all-embracing as it had been when they were with the Taat-living with other nests had weakened it-but the connection remained strong enough for Jaina to know the sense of urgency that filled every fiber of Zekk’s body, and to understand the reason for it. UnuThul was coming with the Moon Fleet.
The struts had barely touched the jungle floor before Jaina’s astromech was opening the canopy and tweedling a welcome.
“Nice to see you, too, Sneaky,” Jaina said. “All systems go?”
The droid gave an affirmative whistle, and Jaina felt a wave of concern from Zekk. She looked battered and exhausted and bloody. Maybe she was not ready to start flying missions.
“You think the Chiss will wait while we take a nap?” Jaina retorted. Without waiting for a reply, she turned to her Wuluw communications assistant and reached down to rub a forearm along an antenna. “Sorry for getting you killed so many times, Wuluw.”
“Burru,” Wuluw thrummed. “U bru.”
“You be careful, too,” Jaina said. “Someday, the Song will have a verse about your bravery at the Battle of Tenupe.”
“Rrrr.” Wuluw’s mandibles clattered in embarrassment, then she waved all four arms in modesty. “Uburr.”
Jaina and Zekk laughed, then Jaina stepped over to her StealthX, retrieved her flight suit from the cockpit and gladly changed out of her mud-caked combat utilities.
She was just climbing into the pilot’s seat when her mother suddenly touched her through the Force. Leia seemed terribly alarmed and was clearly trying to warn Jaina and Zekk about something, but the feeling was too vague to tell more.
Then Jaina and Zekk felt Saba reaching out to them as well, opening herself to a battle-meld. They did the same, and the situation immediately grew clearer. Saba and Leia were here, somewhere near Tenupe, and they needed Jaina and Zekk in the air. Something terrible was coming, something that had to be stopped.
Jaina hastily buckled her crash webbing, then glanced out at Wuluw, and she and Zekk wondered if this was something they should warn the Killiks about.
Yes! The impression came from both Saba and Leia, so strong that Jaina and Zekk heard it inside their minds as an actual word. Must!
Wuluw started to turn around and leave, but Jaina caught her in the Force and floated her back to the StealthX.
“Urubu rubuhu!” the Killik drummed as Jaina suspended her next to the starfighter. “Brurb!”
“Don’t worry, you’re not coming with us,” Jaina said. “And even if you were, I really doubt you’d burst. StealthXs have inertial compensators.”
“Urb?”
“You need to warn the swarm,” Jaina said. “Something bad is coming:”
“Rr?”
“We don’t know. My .”
Jaina stopped, unsure whether she should reveal the source of her foreboding. She had heard how her parents had interfered with the Utegetu evacuation, and she knew the Colony would disapprove of any effort to end the war, so she and Zekk both thought it was probably best not to mention Leia and Saba.
“We’re getting a strong feeling from the Force.” Jaina returned Wuluw to the ground. “Warn the swarm-and alert UnuThul!”
Jaina lowered the StealthX canopy and energized the repulsor drives, then followed Zekk up into the top of the jungle, where the defoliated mogos were now shattered and burning. Chiss megalaser strikes were lancing down through the clouds
like
a
Bespinese
lightning
squall,
igniting kilometer-long columns of flash fire and turning the lower sky into a region of flame-storm and hot, buffeting winds.
The two Jedi ascended toward the cloud ceiling half blinded by alternating instants of crimson brilliance and stormy dimness, trusting their stick hands to the Force, weaving and rolling their way through a forest of crackling energy. They were dimly aware of a quiet area by the river, where an erratic stream of Chiss shuttles was diving into the mass of Killiks swirling above the islands. But they did not even consider entering the enemy’s rescue corridor. As nerve racking as it was to ascend through a barrage, it was far better than the alternative: being spotted by a rescue pilot and having a squadron of clawcraft jump them.
The cloud cover made the ascent especially challenging. The megamaser beams did not seem to descend so much as manifest from the mist. Jaina and Zekk constantly found themselves reacting rather than anticipating, rolling away from a fading column of flame only to find a new one erupting ahead. To make matters worse, their tactical displays revealed two squadrons of clawcraft circling through the clouds around them-enough to make even Jedi grind their teeth and curse under their breaths.