Page 49 - Star Wars Insider #175

FICTION

Something struck the TIE fi ghter, fortunately, served not only to damage
hard. The ship shuddered, tumbled the wing but also to push her toward
off in a different direction, but did not the moon, and without the pull of the
explode. A piece of one of the sleek, Death Star to counter it, the gravity

fragile wings flashed across Iden’s fi eld of Yavin’s small satellite was greedy.
of vision and she realized that control She couldn’t direct her trajectory, but
of the vessel was out of her hands. she could manage it. Iden went on the
Others would panic, or weep, or rail. offensive—a preferred tactic—but this
But Iden had been raised to never, ever time not against a rebel vessel. This
quit, and now, at this moment, she was time, her enemy was the debris that
grateful for her father’s implacability. hurtled toward her.
The ship was careening and, as she She spun toward the moon’s
could do nothing to stop it, she took a surface, targeting anything in her path
few seconds to observe. and blasting it into rubble. This sort
The prospect of her own violent and, of thing was second nature, so she
possibly, painful and prolonged death let part of her mind deal with how
was something that held little fear for to manage the process of reentry, a
her. But what she saw in those seconds controlled crash, and ejection.
struck terror down to her bones. There would then be avoiding
It was the blue-green moon of Yavin. capture, stealing a vessel, and
And it was completely intact. absconding with it, presuming she
Not. Possible! landed on Yavin’s moon in one piece.
She thought of the dreadful silence There it was again, that frisson of
on the comm. And now that she bestial, primitive panic, closing her
knew, now that she had wrapped her throat. Iden swallowed hard even
brain around something that was as cold sweat dewed her body—

“WHAT SHE SAW IN THOSE SECONDS
STRUCK TERROR DOWN TO HER
BONES. IT WAS YAVIN. INTACT.”

not supposed to happen, that no one —beneath the uniform of an
had ever imagined could happen, she Imperial offi cer—
recognized some of the pieces that she —beneath the helm of a TIE fi ghter
was trying so desperately to evade. pilot—
They were of Imperial construction. —and again took a deep, calming

Imperial. breath. The oxygen was finite, but it
Pieces of the greatest battle was better to use it now to help her
station that— focus than later as she panicked.
A single short, harsh, disbelieving Iden was, as far as she knew, the sole
gasp racked her slender frame. Then survivor out of over a million victims
Iden Versio clenched her teeth against of this act of rebel terrorism. She had
a second outburst. Pressed her lips to survive, if only to honor those who
together to seal it inside her. hadn’t. Who hadn’t chased the foe in
She was a Versio, and Versios did an impulsive act that ought to have
not panic. been a mistake, but instead had gifted
The destruction of the Death Star was her with a chance to live.
the brutal and irrevocable truth that the She would find a way back to

impossible was now possible. Which Imperial space ready to continue the

meant she could survive this. fight against the Rebel Alliance for as
And she was going to. long as it took to eliminate every last
Iden clawed her way back to control one of the bastards.
and assessed the situation with a bright, Her jaw set and her eyes narrowed
sharp, almost violent clarity. with determination, Iden Versio braced
The impact of the debris strike had, herself for a bumpy landing.

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