"Like with the old TIE fighters," Luke said, his stomach growling as he sniffed at the aromas rising from the packet. Karkan ribenes with tomo-spice; one of his favorite meals. Mara must have had a hand in the menu arrangements. "I never thought the TIE design made much sense."
Mara shrugged as she laid out the tray of ribenes, set a golden plaitfruit beside it, and pulled out two bottles of flavored water. "They were cheap to make, and Palpatine didn't mind spending pilots. Lunch is served. Dig in."
Luke set at the meal with enthusiasm, tearing the ribenes off the slab and devouring them right down to the bone, alternating with bites of the plaitfruit. It had been a long time since he'd eaten, and healing trances were always hard on energy reserves. Mara took a couple of the smaller ribenes, but from the way she nibbled at them it was clear she must have already eaten aboard Outbound Flight and was simply being companionable.
Midway through the meal the control board pinged with the announcement that the Skysprite had reached the edge of the planetoid's gravity well. Mara keyed in the hyperdrive, and with a flash of starlines they were off.
They chatted about inconsequential things as they ate, mostly just enjoying the chance to spend a few minutes of tranquility together. Luke finished off the ribenes and plaitfruit, and Mara produced a pair of choclime twists for dessert. "So," she commented as Luke bit into his. "When are you going to tell me about that deep revelation back in the recovery room?"
"Nothing deep or surprising," he told her, savoring the sweet tang. "It was just a random thought."
"Such as?" she asked, taking a bite of her twist.
"Such as, why should we settle for just warning the Brask Oto station?" he said. "Dreadnaughts might not have been known for speed, but they were known for toughness, and I doubt Thrawn took out all the weapons in his attack. Even if the station is alerted, it's going to have a hard time taking both a Dreadnaught and a Vagaari battle carrier."
"Agreed," Mara said. "So option two is?"
He smiled at her. "We intercept the Dreadnaught en route, get aboard, and take it back ourselves."
"Uh-huh," she said. "Just the two of us?"
Luke shrugged. "They won't be expecting it, that's for sure."
"No, it sounds too crazy even for us," Mara agreed dryly. "Any particular ideas on how we would get aboard without them noticing and massing fire against us?"
"Already taken care of," Luke assured her. "Back when Evlyn and I were retreating down the pylon, I threw my lightsaber into one of the D-Four turbolift doors, opening it to space. Assuming the local blast doors are working, that should have isolated the whole lobby area from the rest of the ship. We maneuver this thing into what's left of the pylon, go inside, reseal the hole I cut, repressurize, and we're in."
"Great," Mara said. "Then all we have to do is cut our way through two hundred Vagaari soldiers and take over the ship."
"Something like that," Luke agreed. "You game?"
Mara shrugged. "Sure, why not? I didn't have anything else planned for after lunch."
"Good," Luke said, wiping his fingers and mouth with his napkin and dropping it into the empty ribene container. "Then all we have to do is plot out our intercept point, maybe use some Jedi navigation technique to make up a little more time, and we'll be in."
"Right," Mara said, slipping the last half of her choclime twist back into its wrapper and resealing it. "Except that I'll be doing all that. Your job right now is to finish healing."
Luke grimaced. But she was right. "Fine," he said with a theatrical sigh as he adjusted his chair to horizontal position. "You always get all the fun stuff."
"I know," Mara said sweetly. "And I appreciate you indulging me that way. Now, go to sleep."
"Okay." Luke took a deep breath and stretched out to the Force. "Just don't forget to wake me when we get there."
"You'll be the first to know," she promised. "Pleasant dreams."
His last view before the darkness of the healing trance folded over him was of her red-gold hair shimmering in the light as she bent over the navigation console.
CHAPTER 24
"I love you."
Luke jerked slightly as he came out of his healing trance. "Are we there?" he asked, working moisture into his mouth.
"We're there," she confirmed. "More importantly, so is our wayward Dreadnaught. It came into the system about fifteen minutes ago and is angling around the star to get into position for the next jump. It should be crossing our bow in about half an hour."
Luke peered out the canopy at the asteroid Mara had settled the Skysprite beside. "Nice location," he complimented her. "How'd you manage to sneak in without them spotting you?"
"Actually, we were a little ahead of them," Mara told him. "They weren't anywhere in sight, so I gambled that they hadn't picked up an hour or two somewhere along the way and settled in to wait."
"Good," Luke said, stretching again and bringing his seat back to a sitting position. "Where exactly are we?"
"Well, that's the bad news," Mara admitted. "We're only another hour or two outside the Brask Oto Command Station. If we let them get back into hyperspace, we're going to be pushing it to take back the ship in time."
"Okay, so it'll be a challenge," Luke said, offhandedly. "I think we can handle it."
Mara frowned suspiciously at him. "You're not going all super-Jedi on me, are you?"
Luke gave her an innocent look. "Me?"
"Skywalker—" she said warningly.
He grinned once, then sobered. "No, of course not," he assured her. "I just don't think they're going to put up that much resistance, that's all. We pretty well proved aboard Outbound Flight that we can take them."
"We proved it to the ones who didn't survive," Mara pointed out. "I'm not convinced Bearsh and Estosh will have gotten the message. You're not really expecting them to just surrender, are you?"
"No, not really," Luke said regretfully. "But I don't think their troops will just stand there and get themselves slaughtered, either. If we can push them back to the bridge, I'm going to offer Estosh a deaclass="underline" we'll let him and his people leave the Dreadnaught, get back into their carrier, and leave in peace."
"Under Chiss escort, of course," Mara said. "And if he doesn't go for it?"
Luke grimaced. "Then we'll just have to take them out."
"Sounds reasonable," Mara said. "Come on; you've got just enough time for a quick snack before we have to get ready."
They were in their vac suits and back at their chosen control boards when the Dreadnaught appeared around the side of the asteroid. It was, Luke noted, nearly five minutes ahead of Mara's estimate. Estosh was apparently pushing the ancient ship for all it was worth.
"Okay," he muttered, watching the huge mass of metal lumber past and trying to gauge the best moment to swing out of their partial concealment. The massive sublight engines blazed into view—
He threw power to the Skysprite's drive, blasting them away from the asteroid on a vector paralleling the Dreadnaught's course. Keeping them clear of the larger ship's ion emissions, he swung them around the starboard side and underneath. The stumps of the four broken turbolift pylons looked like sections of a model maker's mounting stand in the light from the distant star. "Anything?" he asked as he swung toward the aft-portside tube.
"No course twitching; nothing tracking us," Mara reported. "Of course, the aft sensors are the ones the Colonists would probably have skipped if they hadn't felt like fixing everything."
"Or they may just have skipped the point-defense weaponry back here," Luke reminded her, easing up to the shattered end of the pylon for a closer look. It didn't look like there was going to be enough room for him to lift the Skysprite straight upward, canopy-first, as he would into a standard docking bay.