The X-wing screamed over the canopy, carving a wind trail of torn leaves behind it. Though it was in trouble! The left engine was stuttering, the rudder jigged and the cockpit was filling with smoke.
But Hank “The Ace” Anderson didn’t lose that easily! Fighting the stick, he grabbed the rabbit’s foot dangling from the rear-view mirror, kissed it for luck and heard it say, “Everyone loses sometimes, Hank.”
“Not today!”
Pew! Pew! Kablam!
Hank’s head slammed into the dash as his right engine took a direct hit. He cried out in pain: “Damn you, Shadow!” His nemesis.
In his mirror Hank saw the blood sliding down his forehead, right over another scar the Shadow had gifted him. As good as Hank was, the Shadow was just a bit better.
The smoke grew thicker and he knew a fire was just moments from roasting him alive. He was desperate. Then he saw it! Ten clicks to starboard…The Great Tree!
The conifer was so massive its tip scraped the troposphere, and its upper branches were a maze of death. But Hank knew them like the back of his hand. The Shadow didn’t!
“Baby, you’re gonna save me again!”
He just needed to make it to the base and start the circular climb. Once he was in the branches it would be game over! He grinned, diverted all power to the rear shields and engines, then turned the stick straight for it.
Kaboom!
Shadow’s red plasma bolt hit the right engine, blowing it apart. The explosion rocked the X-wing and sent it flat-spinning to the surface.
“Damn you, Shadow! Damn youuu!”
The trees clawed at the falling fighter, tearing away its metal plating. Desperate, Hank pumped the boosters and with a final jolt of power brought the nose up just enough to send the ship careening into the forked branches of a large elm. It sliced the ship in two, dropping the nose into the soft, deep Endor soil.
Spitting blood, Hank crawled out of the smoking wreck just as his cockpit erupted into a fireball, sending blooms of smoke high into the treetops.
He smiled. “Thanks, old girl, you saved me again!”
But Shadow was coming! He heard the ship growl as it landed. The walkway extended…
…with a snakelike hiss. Half-conscious, Hank heard the metal boots of his enemy approach and closed his eyes as his doom grew near. The Shadow’s helmet, with a thunk, was discarded onto the nearby grass. The footsteps stopped next to Hank’s head and a menacing laugh erupted above him.
“Well…you finally got me!” Hank exclaimed, opening his eyes to see the dark face of his nemesis staring down. All these years he’d only ever seen it on a comm screen… He was handsomer than expected. Something about his dark skin drew him in. Hank was pale and fair, and his sworn enemy was—his Shadow. Even as his opponent drew a knife, squatted down and readied himself for the kill, it wasn’t fear in Hank’s heart. What was it?
Their faces grew closer but the blade didn’t move.
Why hasn’t he killed me?! Does he feel it, too?
The two enemies’ lips were inches apart and neither knew what to do. Their hearts were racing. They were sworn enemies, yet….
“Gil! What is the garbage still doing in the kitchen? I told you to empty it 25 minutes ago!” his mother cried out from the doorway, glaring at her 11-year-old.
“I did!” Gil sulked, still holding the Rebel fighter pilot and Tie Bomber action figures in a Spider-Man/Mary Jane upside-down-kissing pose. Next to him, their respective ships lay crashed in the yard’s freshly cut Tennessee bluegrass.
“If you don’t get in here right now, I will take those Star Wars toys and throw THEM away, too!”
He set the action figures down and rose in a huff, stomping his way to the back of the one-story rambler. At the doorway, he looked back at the wounded fighter pilot and his curious nemesis and wondered how it would end…until his mother yanked him inside and back to reality. “Now, young man!”