Free The Han Solo Adventures by Brian Daley Page B

man threw himself in to help and she came right behind. The sliding, jockeying string of four ships plunged toward the planet’s surface.
    The IRD made its kill a moment later. Headhunter six split apart in a blossom of fire and wreckage just as its killer came under Jessa’s wing man’s guns.
    The Espo flyer applied more of his ship’s amazing speed to improve his lead and came up as if he were going into a loop, making the Lafrarian misjudge. The IRD flashed out of the maneuver instead, in a lightning-fast turn, banked, and managed to make a high deflection shot.
    The IRD’s cannon scored, and her wing man’s Headhunter shook as Jessa raised her voice in alarm, sheering off as quickly as she could. She banked and sensed a shadow near. The IRD swooped past. She swerved and shot at it instinctively. The burst scored, penetrating the IRD’s shields. As the IRD dropped away in an emergency power dive, its pilot struggling to adjust his craft’s thrust bias and avert disaster, Jessa ignored Han’s dictum that she ride her kill. She returned to see what she could do for her wing mate.
    Exactly nothing. The Lafrarian’s ship was damaged but not in danger of crashing. He’d put it into a shallow glide, extending his wings to their fullest.
    “Can you make it?”
    “Yes, Jessa. But at least one of the IRD has gotten through. The other may manage to rejoin him.”
    “Nurse your ship back. I’ve got to get down there.”
    “Good hunting, Jessa!”
    She opened her ship’s engines in a power dive.
    Han found out right away that the IRD leader was a good pilot. He discovered it by nearly getting his easy chair shot out from underneath him.
    The Espo flyer was hot, accurate with his weaponry, deft with his maneuvers. He and Han quickly joined in circling, pouncing, cloverleaf battle, the upper hand alternating between them. Rolling, looping, doing their best to turn inside each other’s turns, sliding into and out of each other’s gun-sights over and over, they never let their sticks sit still for an instant.
    For the third time Han shook the IRD off, playing on his Headhunter’s greater maneuverability against the IRD’s superior speed. He watched the Espo flyer try to pick him up again. “I guess you must be the local champ, huh?” The IRD came at him once more. “Have it your way, bozo, Let’s see what you’ve really got.”
    He split-S down deeper into the planet’s atmosphere as the IRD sprang at his tail, gaining in the descent but unable to hold the Headhunter in his sights. Han pulled up sharply, twisted his ship into a half loop, flipped over, and went into a diving aileron roll with another loop thrown in, coming out of the combo in the opposite direction.
    Cannon blasts streaked by over the canopy bubble, barely missing. Man, this Espo can really latch , Han told himself. But he has a few things left to learn. School ain’t over yet.
    He rammed the stick into the corner for a pushover and began a power dive. The IRD hung in but couldn’t quite draw a bead on him. Han pushed the Headhunter to its limits, ducking and slipping as the Espo pilot raked at him. The snub’s engines moaned, and every particle of her vibrated as if desiring to fly apart. Han jostled, watching his Heads-Up Display for the reading he wanted, The IRD’s shots ranged closer.
    Then he had it. He began pulling out of his dive, nosing up slowly and dreading the shot from behind that would end all his problems and hopes.
    But the IRD pilot held off, not wanting to waste the opportunity, waiting for the Headhunter to present a spread-eagled silhouette in his gunsight. Han thought, Sure, he wants this one to be the perfect kill .
    He yanked into a turn as the IRD aligned itself trailing him into it and edging for a lead. Han cheated the turn tighter, and tighter yet. But the IRD pilot clung doggedly, to end the frustrating chase and prove who was the hotter pilot.
    And then Han had the turn tighter than ninety degrees, the thing