The Falcon shoots into the destroyer’s fading salvo, wobbling slightly in the turbulence. If she can streak out of range before the next wave of the energy storm, Han can jump into hyperspace and the Falcon will be free.
“More power, Chewie!” he demands.
Chewbacca points to the sublight drive output monitor. The display reads one hundred twenty-one percent.
“Don’t quote me overloads,” Han says. “Give me more power!”
A turbolaser shot blossoms above the freighter, then another flares to her right. The destroyer has unleashed another salvo. Chewie adjusts the repulsor output and the Falcon accelerates imperceptibly, barely clearing the Eradicator’s range!
Han slaps in the hyperdrive and the stars assume a red tinge. A moment later, the Falcon jumps to supralight speed and is lost in a doppler-shifted cascade of starlight.
At last, the smugglers can relax. The Eradicator will not bother them again. Not even the Empure can track starships through hyperspace. To harass the smugglers any further, the Eradicator captain would have to know (or guess) their hyperspace departure coordinates. Han suspects that the captain will be more concerned with the Imperial corvette than with a dilapidated Corellian freighter.
During the next standard week, Han and Chewbacca overhaul the Falcon and repair the incidental damage the TIE fighters had managed to inflict. They also attend to a much more serious matter – the malfunctioning transmission channel.
Finally, everything that can be repaired aboard the Falcon has been and they have nothing to do except stare at the endless streaks of star systems. As beautiful as it is, the view can only occupy one’s mind for so long.
“I can’t figure Leia,” Han says. He wants to talk, and Leia is the only subject he can think of to discuss. “Just when I think she’s a human being, she goes off and acts like a princess again. Does she like us or not?”
Chewbacca grunts a response.
“It doesn’t matter?” says Han. “That’s easy for you to say.” Five minutes later, he adds, “Maybe she just doesn’t like Wookiees.”
“Eeerrogh?”
“Lots of people don’t like Wookiees,” Han informs his co-pilot. “You don’t have to take it personally.”
“Ooouuuugh!”
“What makes you thin it’s me she doesn’t like? She probably got herself kidnapped just so I’d rescue her again!”
Chebacca growls, then falls silent.
Something clicks in the Corellian’s mind. He stares out the viewport, barely aware of the splendor he watches. An hour later, he says, “I know who Alfreda Goot is! She’s Leia!”
Chewie looks at Han as if he is crazy.
“Think about it. No one’s ever heard of Alfreda Goot. Even if she does exist, how would a stranger have known we were going to ORd Mantell? And who would challenge me to a race, except Leia? I tell you, this is some crazy scheme Leia cooked up to prove she’s as good as I am!”
Dubiously, Chewbacca eyes the pilot, but does not contradict him.