The Nut Gatherers

A few of the pilots laughed humorlessly. One of them was a teenaged fighterjockey seated next to Luke who bore the unlikely name of Wedge Antilles. ArtooDetoo was there also, seated next to another Artoo unit who emitted a long whistle ofhopelessness. "A two-meter target at maximum speed—with a torpedo, yet," Antilles snorted."That's impossible even for the computer." "But it's not impossible," protested Luke. "I used to bulls-eye womp-rats in myT-17 back home. They're not much bigger than two meters." "Is that so?" the rakishly uniformed youth noted derisively. "Tell me, when youwere going after your particular varmint, were there a thousand other, what did youcall it, 'womp-rats' armed with power rifles firing up at you?" He shook his headsadly. "With all that firepower on the station directed at us, this will take a little morethan barnyard marksmanship, believe me." As if to confirm Antilles' pessimism, Dodonna indicated a string of lights on theever-changing schematic. "Take special not of these emplacements. There's aheavy concentration of firepower on the latitudinal axes, was well as several densecircumpolar clusters. "Also, their field generators will probably create a lot of distortion, especially inand around the trench. I figure that maneuverability in that sector will be less thanpoint three." This produced more murmurs and a few groans from the assembly. "Remember," the General went on, "you must achieve a direct hit. Yellowsquadron will cover for Red on the first run. Green will cover Blue on the second.Any questions?" a muted buzz filled the room. One man stood, lean and handsome—too muchso, it seemed, to be ready to throw away his life for something as abstract as freedom. "What if both runs fail, What happens after that?"