While everyone was moving to get the ship up and flying, I took a look out of the large forward viewport. Fires and smoke billowed across the large starport, both because of my distraction and because of Wedge, Hobbie, and Tycho tearing across the sky, firing off missiles and barrages of green laser fire. I could see the burned wreckage of several standard TIE fighters already on the ground and rising smoke over the more distant parts of the base. The pilots were clearly eager to prove I had made the right choice, and as far as I could see, I absolutely had.

  Seeing that the pilots were dancing across the sky, avoiding dangerous defensive fire and taking their pound of flesh for their unwilling stay, I turned back to focus on my job. Since I had no skill in flying ships that were more complex than a simple speeder, I instead focused on the turbolifts, specifically keeping watch for anyone coming up behind us. They wouldn't stand much of a chance, even if I wasn't standing guard, but I wanted Tatnia, Racer, and Nal to be able to devote their full attention to their tasks.

  It took about six minutes for Racer to whistle out that he now had full access to the entire ship, which he proved by turning off the emergency alarm. He continued to whistle, his dome spinning around, until Tatnia realized he had hacked the console she was standing by and was communicating through text.

  "Racer says that most of the crew has already been taken care of," she said, reading off her console. "Should he guide the others to them?"

  "Yes, definitely. Then split them up and send them to the most vital areas of the ship, like the power core or any other easily sabotaged and vital area," I instructed, Racer whistling in confirmation. "Tatnia, Nal, what's the word, can you take off?"

  "I… believe I can get us into space and, with Racer's help, make a jump," Tatnia confirmed with a nod. "We will be sitting ducks, but we can get up there."

  "Great, warm her up, we are leaving this rock," I said, getting a nod in return. "Nal, any luck on comms?"

  "Racer has given me access to comms and the hyperwave," Nal confirmed. "We are ready."

  "Alright, call the pilots back, they are just flying laps for fun at this point anyway," I responded, smirking a bit as he spoke into his console.

  I turned away from the turbolifts and headed back to the bridge proper, looking out of the viewport at the base. It didn't take long for the TIE hunters to return and dock in our large hangar. Once they were, I nodded to Tatnia, who slowly powered up the ship, the thrum of the engines vibrating the ship before equalling out.

  "Nal, get me scans of the defensive fleet," I said. "I need to know what we are up against."

  Nal nodded, and a few seconds later, I peeked over his shoulder to see the results of the scan. Considering the size of the base, I was not surprised to find we were up against a not-insignificant force. A pair of, four, several, and the most dangerous of all, a single.

  "Okay… damn. Call them in, Nal," I ordered, chewing the inside of my cheek. "Let's hope they got enough ships in time. And send our scans as well. Tatnia, give him a few seconds, and then bring us up. Angle us away from the fleet as best as possible."

  I could hear Nal putting together a quick message to our hopefully waiting allies. He was just finishing it off and sending it out as the ship began rising off the starport. As we were rising, the turbolifts activated, and I whirled around to cover them with Chain Lighting. Racer whistled something, but before I could figure out what, a heavily breathing Wedge, Tycho, and Hobbie burst from a lift. They stumbled onto the bridge, leaning on consoles as they recovered. I let my magic fizzle out with a grin.

  "Welcome back, and nice work," I said with a nod. "Find a gunner station and try and work it out. This is gonna be tight."

  They nodded and quickly found their spots, tapping at their consoles while I turned back to the viewport. The escort carrier was still slowly rising off the ground, twisting and angling away from the base, picking up speed as we headed toward the clouds.

  "The defensive fleet is hailing us, wondering what we are doing," Nal warned us. "They are also asking for an update on what's going on."

  "Start feeding them bullshit," I ordered. "The longer it takes them to-"

  "Too late, Boss. It seems we missed a passcode or something," Nal said with a frown. "They are pulling around. Time to intercept is… three minutes at current speed and heading."

  "Dammit... okay, keep moving, put everything into shields and engines," I ordered, a slight hum spreading through the deck as our engines were put into overdrive. "Nal, put the data up somewhere I can see it."

  Nal nodded, and almost immediately, a layout of the area appeared in an advanced wireframe model in the center of the bridge, above a holoprojector. I could see the opposing forces, gathered around the Victory-class, moving above the planet's atmosphere to intercept us. We seemed to be lucky, as the smaller ships, which could have likely intercepted us much quicker, seemed to be holding back, staying with the Victory-class. They also appeared to be specifically angling to intercept us the planet's atmosphere rather than meeting us at the optimal point.

  "They don't want us falling back to the planet," Wedge guessed, sitting not far from me, peeking at the display.

  "They want us to surrender," Tatnia countered, shaking her head. "If we can land, we can run. In space, they can capture us with tractor beams and force us to surrender."

  "Let's hope they don't get that opportunity," I said with a frown. "I don't think we can clear out a Victory-class quick enough to escape before more Imperial ships show up."

  Our ship worked hard to keep the distance between the fleet and us alive, giving our allies as much time as possible. As they got closer and closer, it became clear that Tatnia was right, as none of them fired a single shot, even when they entered the furthest edges of their weapon ranges. They got closer and closer, and I could feel the pit in my stomach dropping lower and lower.

  "Wedge… Those TIE hunters… can they jump to hyperspace?" I asked, looking over at him.

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  "Yeah, they do," He confirmed. "Do you think…"

  "It's better to be safe than sorry," I confirmed with a nod, holding back a curse. "Everyone, head down to the hangar. Racer, program a collision course with the Victory class and-"

  Before I could continue the order to escape, they finally arrived.

  The first to enter the battlefield was the, quickly followed by the while the and were apparently absentFrom our perspective, they entered just behind and above the Imperial defensive fleet and immediately opened fire. The Imperial fleet scrambled, going from a coherent and orderly formation to a chaotic mess in just over a few seconds. For just a moment, I was worried that that was all that was coming until the Rebellion proved me wrong.

  A massive ship dropped out of hyperspace, not far from the a Mon Calamari MC80, and one that I actually recognized on sight. They had sent the to act as cover for us. Several more large ships entered the system, including a trio of, each of them opening fire on the now comparatively small fleet. The Imperial ships scrambled fighters, but even as they did, we could see several of their ships exploding, and the shields of the Victory-class flicker as they took a pounding.

  We cheered, jumping from our seats as our allies drew the ire of the larger ships, pounding them with turbolaser fire as we pulled away, making a bee-line for empty space.

  "Tatnia, how much time do we need?" I called out, eyes still on the battlefield we were avoiding.

  "Uhh…one minute thirty!"

  "Nal, tell that to our rescue fleet," I instructed, chewing on my lip. "Tatnia, make the jump the second we are ready. The sooner we can leave, the sooner they can too."

  Even as we traveled, it was clear the Rebel fleet was fighting defensively, the 3rd Group following their lead. Even as they destroyed one of the Arquitens, they were maneuvering to a jump angle, most of them rotating to keep freshly recharged shields taking the brunt of the Imperial's ire. Even as they did that, they also managed to turn their movements into a broadside pass, hammering the Imperial fleet. We got to see one last Imperial ship explode before Tatnia shouted, "Jumping!" and suddenly, the stars melted into streaks.

  We were in hyperspace.

  Again, we cheered, throwing our hands into the air and jumping up and down, all while sharing handshakes and hugs. We had pulled off a mission that many would consider impossible, and as far as we could tell, with zero casualties. Ackbar must have left the smaller ships of his fleet behind, guaranteeing that they wouldn't lose anyone since the larger ships had much more staying power. They weren't going to be around long enough for their shields to be taken down, after all. When everyone calmed down, I took a long breath and laughed.

  "Well done, everyone! That was incredible! You should all be proud of what we just accomplished," I said with a smile. "Wedge, Hobbie, Tycho, well done to you as well. Happy to have gotten you three out, safe and sound. Now we have…"

  I looked over at Tatnia, who frowned for a moment before realizing what I was looking for. She took a peek at her console before finding the information and looking back up at me.

  "About an hour."

  "About an hour before we reach the rendezvous point," I said, eyeing everyone. "I want to make sure that there is no one else on board but us. Racer, keep an eye on the internal sensors and start going through the ship's programming. I want to know if there is anything lurking behind the scenes. Pilots, hold the bridge for us, just in case."

  If Wedge and the others had an issue being left behind, they didn't mention it. Instead, they seemed content to sit at their consoles, watching through the viewports and talking amongst themselves. Meanwhile, Tatnia, Nal, and I hopped onto the turbo lift and started clearing some of the less important areas, with Racer guiding us around. It was slow going, and the ship was thankfully mostly empty. I could only imagine most of the crew was probably on shore, and I wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

  Out of the few crew, Racer steered us too, most of them surrendered immediately, while the rest seemed determined to fight to the last. Those who surrendered were taken to the mess hall, where Nal ended up staying to watch over them. Those who didn't were left where they made their last stands. We would eventually have labor droids haul them to the cargo bay.

  After about fifty minutes of clearing room after room after room, we went back up to the bridge. Racer couldn't detect any more crew, so either there was no one left, or they were hiding where there weren't any sensors, which ruled out anything important or sensitive.

  When we dropped out of hyperspace, we were immediately hailed by several ships at once. Most notably, at least to me, was the , , and , but there were quite a few Rebel ships as well. It seemed that Admiral Ackbar, or whoever was in charge of the fleet, had left all of the smaller members of their fleet behind here rather than at Alpha Base or wherever they started.

  We quickly confirmed our identities and our current status, and within a few minutes, we had two dozen Rebels on board, going through the ship, scanning its interior, and looking for anything that might be revealing our location. I wasn't ecstatic about having so many of them on what was probably going to become one of the 4th Group's ships, but I recognized the need to be certain we weren't about to have an even larger Imperial fleet drop in on us.

  While the Rebels were running the deep scan, the rest of the fleet arrived back, the 3rd Fleet quickly taking up a position next to us. A shuttle from the transferred three dozen B2s to our newest ship, which we then spread throughout the ship to cover sensitive areas, just in case there were any Imperials we missed. After that, that same shuttle took my team and I, as well as Wedge, Hobbie, and Tycho, to , a pit stop on the way back to the

  The trip was short, and we were guided into a large hangar bay, where a mix of X-wings, A-wings, and Y-wings, as well as several more random starfighters, were being kept. They took up the majority of the space, mostly because quite a few of them were actively being worked on. The rest was a space for us, as well as a great group of people, all watching us come in. Even the mechanics working on the starfighters stopped to watch us slowly land in the hangar.

  By now, we had taken our helmets off, clipping them to our belts. Everyone seemed to be standing up a bit straighter, ready to meet the crowd head-on.

  Together we stepped down the shuttle's boarding ramp, the decent-sized crowd of maybe fifty people cheering. We were quickly greeted by Admiral Akbar, who shook the pilot's hands first. They were then promptly whisked away for debriefing and a medical check-up. I noticed an extra set of security guards following close to Tycho, and I had to remind myself that he actually wasn't technically a Rebel yet. His defection was the whole reason they got captured in the first place.

  "Admiral Deacon, it is good to see you again," Admiral Ackbar said, shaking my hand as well. "You and your team have managed to bring home some of our best, all against near-impossible odds. Thank you for your efforts."

  "We were happy to help," I assured him with a smile. "It was the exact sort of mission my teams excel at."

  "Given your rather impressive track record, I would have to agree," He responded with a nod, watching as the crowd began to disperse. "Again, thank you for saving our pilots, as well as the defector. So much of our news is negative, it will be nice to spread such good news for a change."

  "I'm happy to help provide a boost in morale," I said with a smile. "Besides, it wouldn't have been possible without your support at the end."

  "Something tells me you would have found a way," He responded, giving a very human shrug.

  "Perhaps, but that kid of improvisation tends to get dirty very fast."

  "That it does, Admiral. That it does," He agreed, pausing for a moment before nodding. "I am sure you must be eager to rest on board your own ship, so I will not keep you. I will ask that, if you have time, you return to Alpha Base rather than your mystery home. I believe that Mon Mothma has arrived at Alpha Base and wishes to meet you and deliver your payment herself."

  "Well, in that case, how could we say no?" I said with a smile. "Shall we cordinate out jumps home?"

  "I'll have the jump numbers sent to you," the Mon Calamarian agreed with a nod. "We shall leave once your new ship has been confirmed clean."

  We shook hands a final time before turning back and climbing back into the shuttle, taking off a moment later to head back to the