“Parnell will take his time with Erling,” Luke says. “We have nothing to lose by warning the Tredways about Erling’s arrest, and we just might learn something useful.”
Sidney flattens his ears and lets a hiss escape his lips, but does not object further.
“We’ll take my Rockcan,” Gideon suggests. “You and Sidney might as well leave your ships here. Nobody’ll bother them.”
Luke smiles mischievously. “They will mine, especially if they’re stormtroopers. I fly an X-wing.”
Both Gideon and Sidney raise an eyebrow. Most pilots know the X-wing is the Alliance’s favorite starfighter. Sidney cannot stop himself from asking, “If you have the X-wing -“
“Don’t ask the boy questions he can’t answer,” Gideon interrupts. “We sure as nova can’t leave it here, but we’d be even bigger fools to take it to Tol Ado.”
“If the Tredways are trustworthy -“
“As space is black,” Gideon promises.
“Good,” Luke finishes. “We’ll ask them to watch it.”
When Luke returns to his starfighter, Artoo is full of warnings and questions about Parnell and his stormtroopers. Luke patiently explains what happened and that he is going to rescue Erling. Artoo pops and whistles excitedly, flashing comments across the vidscreen so fast Luke can barely read them.
“You like the idea?” Luke lifts off. Gideon’s box-shaped prospecting scow already hovers above Henryson. An ancient turbo-laser battery protrudes over the cockpit; Luke guesses that the battery sees more action hammering asteroids than ships. “Remind me to have your motivation circuits overhauled,” he continues. “Besides, you’re not going.”
Artoo chirps and hisses angrily.
“Because I said you’re not, that’s why,” Luke answers. “What I’m doing is bad enough. General Dodonna will flip if you get damaged.”
The Droid remains silent for a long moment, then displays a short message on the vidscreen.
“That’s blackmail!” Luke exclaims. “You wouldn’t dare.”
The message remains.
Luke sighs. “Okay, but I’m definitely having your motivation circuits purged. Who ever heard of a Droid with a thirst for adventure?”
A short time later, Gideon’s Rockcan slows to a crawl. Luke’s cockpit speaker crackles. “We’ve got trouble ahead,” Gideon says. “Look’s like Parnell beat us here.”
Luke pulls abreast of Gideon. Ahead, an egg-shaped asteroid slowly spins around an axis located in its large end. The rock is roughly 10 kilometers long and six in width. Five firepoints buzz over its surface like hungry insects. One of the lightpoints occasionally dives toward a disc of flickering light near the center of the asteroid.
Luke activates his flight computer’s active search mode. The probe alerts the enemy to his presence, but it also reveals the nature of the ships harassing 24 Tredway. “It looks like four TIE fighters escorting an assault shuttle,” Luke reports. “Are you sure this is the Tredway asteroid?”
Gideon grunts an affirmative response. “Who else do you think it might be? Let’s have at ’em!”
Sidney interrupts, “Perhaps it would be wiser to avoid this conflict and travel straight to Tol Ado?”
Luke hesitates. He probably can’t count on much help from Gideon’s Rockcan, and the odds are stacked against him. On the other hand, he is the only thing that stands between the Imperials and 24 Tredway’s complete annihilation.
If Luke attacks the TIE fighters, Click Here
If Luke goes straight to Tol Ado, Click Here