Unscheduled Pit Stops

[Sanis Prent]

"This is stupid, this is stupid, this is stupid!"

The second TIE fighter on my tail made me realize a very poignant sort of lesson. Going to Coruscant sucks. Sure, for the billions upon billions of people without their rap sheet in an Imperial file, its probably not the worst thing in the world. But for a guy like me, it seems like all the wrong people are slow to forget.

"jI told you we shouldn't have taken thjis job!!!"

Cirrsseeto was somehow multitasking fine tuning the engine with cursing me out over the comm. I peeled off into a steep dive through the atmosphere as the TIE's pursued me all the way.

"Sorry mom, I guess you should've just raised me better and maybe I'd see the error of my ways!!!"

I pitched again, suddenly glad I had zombie-kitted some serious retro thrust onto Layla's big ass. For as much bulk as I hauled, I made a Corellian freighter move like nothing since maybe the Millennium Falcon. The TIE's could keep up, of course, but I'd be in far worse trouble if I had a slower ride.

Laser blasts streaked past us. Not good.

"I don't get it! I scrubbed the transponder, forged the ID, did every damn thing I should. How did they get on my tail?"

No time to think about that. I eyed a criss-crossing section of heavy sky traffic, and decided to act crazy.

"Cirr, hang onto something!"

"Sanjis, no, don't do jit, don't go thrrough skylanes agajin!!!"

"Too late!"

I squinted my eyes and grimaced as my freighter went through a conglomeration of flying metal so thick that I should have died twice. We thundered into a dive, and the entire ship seemed to shudder under the strain.

[Cirrsseeto Quez]

In extreme duress, Cirr had reverted to his mother tongue, spewing forth curses and protestations as he wrung his ears nervously, watching the viewer in the engine room. Multiple levels of traffic whipped by, and Cirr ended up averting his eyes, just knowing that the next second would be his last.

"Sanjis jif we don't djie jI am gojing to kjill you!!!"

He nervously watched the coolant pressure ratchet up. Space maneuvers were one thing. Doing anything crazy in atmo added problems like inertia and shear forces and atmospheric resistance to the mix. He could hear the power plant groaning.

"Just shoot them orr somethjing!"

Layla[i] bucked on a flattened trajectory as they cleared a particularly nettlesome bed of freighter traffic. The TIE's diverted high, not feeling they could risk going the same route.

"Get us out of herre, we can't last long out jin the open!"

Sanis's voice came through on the comm.

[i]"Cirr, I got an idea. We're close to some friends, let me see if I can raise them on the comm."

Cirr knew the district by the skyline, and knew the friends he was talking about. Some knockabouts from the old days that they'd worked for. Not Black Sun anymore, who was it? Black Nebula, he thought.

"You mean Corrvus?"

The ship yawed again, and Cirr had to brace against something.

"Yep. Gonna try him while I have breathing space."

Cirr said nothing, but prayed hard to Sanjaara, which was unusual given his normal agnostic leanings.