[Legacy Of The Force] - 01(122)

Laserfire flashed over his cockpit from ahead, and the monitor screen showing data on his shield status flashed red in his peripheral vision, signs that his Shriek had been hit-but there had been no shudder, so the impact had to have been glancing. He saw Wedge’s Shriek waver and sideslip just a little, a successful bid to reduce the amount of laserfire converging on him from ahead. That, Han realized, was his key to getting in front.

He saw another series of red flashes from ahead, more concentrated laserfire, and gauged that the thickest stream of fire was moving in toward the Shrieks from the port side. He did not swerve, but hit his thrusters.

Wedge did swerve, sideslipping again to avoid the worst of the fire, and Han’s perfectly timed acceleration brought him alongside Wedge’s bomber, then just ahead of it. Han ran into the thickest of the laserfire and his shield monitor flashed alarmingly bright-but he was ahead.

And ahead of him, too close, was the artificial gray mountain of the Terkury Housing Complex, the building he was supposed to fly beneath in less than a second

He pulled the trigger on his first concussion missile load, knowing that it was too late for the missiles to hit the street and the debris to clear. He thought about breaking off, going skyward-a suicidal tactic, considering all the laser emplacements and pursuing Galactic Alliance vessels that would be able to fire on him, but not as suicidal as plowing into the side of that building-but there was a flash of yellow to his starboard side as Wedge’s missiles, already launched, shot ahead and plowed into the correct spot on the avenue. The street was suddenly replaced by an expanding cloud of debris, dust, and flame.

Han dived toward a spot just beneath the center of the cloud. He’d be flying blind for a second or two, but he knew the distances, the ranges, the depths. He waited a fraction of a second, until his gut told him that he had to be beneath the level of the street; then he leveled off and fired his second brace of missiles.

He cleared the first cloud. All around him were duracrete support pillars and the broad expanses of empty subterranean hangars; unlit, these features were presented in shades of blue by the heads-up display on the viewport before him. Then his missiles hit, and the wall directly ahead detonated into a second cloud. He plunged into it and climbed, trusting his instincts and timing

And there above him was the sky, tinted by the presence of military shields. “Dropping starting load,” he said, and hit the buttons that would propel the dozens of targeting droids out of his bomb bay.

There was an odd echo to his words, and he realized that the echo was in Wedge’s voice. Wedge had dropped his own ordnance load and announced the fact at the exact moment Han had.

The viewport went black. The Shriek’s vibration and sense of motion ceased. The cockpit was lit for a moment only by the glows from the various displays Han hadn’t looked at once during the mission; then brighter light from behind him illuminated the space as the simulator’s access hatch opened.

Han sighed and used the metal rungs overhead to clamber backward out of the simulator and into a dimly lit corridor. There was s another access hatch, identical to his, a few meters to his right, and two more to his left; Wedge Antilles stood beside one of them, dressed, like Han, in the stylish green-and-black flight suit and helmet of a Shriek pilot, and was already closing his hatch.

Wedge’s features were entirely obscured by the tinting of his helmet’s full-coverage blast visor, but he popped that up to glare at Han. “You don’t have to be in front, you know,” he said. “The mission doesn’t depend on it.”

Han rotated his helmet a quarter turn and pulled it up and off. He offered Wedge his most insufferable grin, the one that, from time to time, came closest to driving Leia to violence. “Sure, I do.”

Wedge’s expression was unrelenting. “Did you notice the part where jockeying for position caused you to miss your missile launch window? Remember that?”

“You covered for me pretty well,” Han said. “You show a lot of promise as a pilot. You ought to consider a career in the military.”

Despite himself, Wedge grinned briefly. “You need to consider working as a team player.” He pulled his own helmet free.

“I’m a team player,” Han protested. “As long as the rest of the team stays behind me.”

“Your flying tactics alarm me-“

“Ooh, General Antilles is alarmed-“

“Because if you end up as a thin red film on the surface of Tralus, Leia will haunt me to the end of my days, which might be only one or two if she’s mad enough.”

Han nodded. “That’s actually a good point. I recommend you keep me alive.”