Allana looked up at her rescuers. “We can go now?”
Leia nodded. “We can go right now.”
“Can I leave a note for, for Jacen?”
“I’m afraid not, sweetie. You can comm him once we get to Hapes. You don’t have time to pack.”
“That’s all right. Everything that’s mine is still at home.”
Impossibly, Saba stood, even got her lightsaber up to deflect the next wave of blaster bolts aimed at her. Smoke rose from her back and legs, and stretches of her skin were charred, bleeding. … but she was upright, standing on shaky legs.
Luke didn’t turn toward Ben, but pitched his voice to make it easier for the boy to hear. “Get her out of here.”
“Remember why I’m here, Grand Master.”
Vexed, Luke tightened his jaw and nodded. He raised his voice. “Master Sebatyne: extract.”
“This one iz still…”
“Leaving.” Luke’s tone was unyielding. “Remember what we’re here for.”
Beyond Jacen, the metal shutters were coming down across the viewports. It wasn’t surprisng; the explosions had to have weakened the viewport housings, and the ship’s diagnostics were sealing everything up before the atmosphere could explosively escape. Besides, all of a sudden there were more ships to see out there, and some of them were approaching the Anakin Solo, laser batteries flashing. Luke gestured toward Jacen. Jacen raised his lightsaber and his left hand, ready to ward off any attack, but Luke’s gesture was a diversion. His exertion in the Force picked up one of the YVH droids and hurtled it backward, against the faltering viewport.
The transparisteel buckled and the droid was lost to space. Air, rushing past the Jedi, tugged them forward, and Jacen staggered back toward the viewports, but then the shutters came down, sealing the bridge.
Meanwhile Luke felt a pained exertion in the Force as Saba leapt up to the walkway and walked-limped-off the bridge.
Three YVH droids were left. And Jacen. Against Luke and Ben. Jacen was Luke’s match, which meant Ben had to cope with three combat droids. The odds weren’t good. Then the odds changed.
As he batted blasterfire with his lightsaber, Luke felt a surge of emotion in the Force: innocent joy, a little girl’s delight at going home.
Jacen visibly paled. “Allana…” Suddenly he charged, crossing his own combat droids’ streams of blasterfire, forcing them to cease fire for brief moments.
He came at Luke but leapt laterally, flying across empty air to one of the doorways leading aft, utterly ignoring the Jedi.
Luke snapped a command to his son: “Extract! Warn Leia, Jacen’s coming!” He got his lightsaber up and deflected new streams of blasterfire, then began backing toward the bridge’s blast doors, toward his son.
Keeping his father and the nearly impenetrable blaster shield Luke represented between himself and the YVH combat droids, Ben backflipped through the blast doors and darted to the right, getting behind the cover the door frame represented. He slammed a palm across the shut button and thumbed his comlink. “Aunt Leia, extract! Jacen’s coming.”
Her voice came back clear and calm: “Already extracting.”
“Go fast.” Ben glanced over his shoulder and saw that the corridor was clear of personnel-the only living thing to be seen was Saba, limping along in the distance. Blaster bolts from the combat droids, bolts Luke did not even bother to deflect, poured out into the corridor like rain blown sideways, but none ventured near Saba.
Luke backed through the blast doors when there was just enough of a gap to accommodate him. They slammed shut, cutting off the torrent of blasterfire.
Ben drove his lightsaber into the control panel and kept shoving, burning a hole clear through to the corresponding panel on the far side.
Luke glanced over at him. “Time to go.”
Chapter 37
Jacen ran through the doors leading to the Command Salon, flashed past nervous, startled officers there, and hurtled to the doors leading into his private office.
His office, with its secret access to the secret quarters-Allana.
In his office, he slammed open the panel leading to his hidden corridor and slid to a halt in the midst of debris and the wreckage that had once been YVH-908.
Mechanically, he raised his comlink to his lips. “Bridge, report on all vehicles proximate to the Anakin Solo.”
There was no answer but the hiss of static.
He could feel Allana astern, moving away from him, but precise distances and speeds were impossible for him to measure. There was a hole in the floor of his little workshop-that had to be the means by which Allana’s kidnappers had entered. But had they left by the same way, or out his office door? He had to follow, but the wrong choice could cost him precious seconds.