Fly by Night

[Gir Quee]

"What am I looking at?" said Gir, eying the spherical object in front of him, "is that a miniature thrustship? But it doesn't quite look like Yevathan make..."

It was an orb over twenty meters in diameter. The admiral had seen many starship designs during his years out in space, some of them were more alien and unorthodox than others, such as the converted ore haulers of the Stenness Node. How and why anyone would bother to kill a gigantic wasp, strap engines to it, and then fly it around the galaxy would probably be beyond the man's comprehension no matter how long he lived. But other starships, while unconventional, seemed to have a certain logic to them that escaped the man's thought process. He was almost certain that this was one of those cases.

"It's a scoutship," informed the mon calamari engineer, "made by Arakyd many years ago. A SkyBlind Recon ship to be exact. It took a little bit of work to find this example, and I'm sure it's not entirely operational..."

"Why is it a sphere? And what does it have to do with the Eidolon Project?"

 

[Salmakk]

"Spheres are very efficient forms in their own ways," mused the engineer, "particularly when it comes to shielding, not unlike the thrustships you already mentioned."

"I don't see shielding being a particular important part of that project..."

"Fair enough," agreed Salmakk, pulling out a datapad.

"What's that for?"

Salmakk tapped a button on the datapad. The sphere began to shift colors, suddenly fading and blending into the background of the duracrete hangar walls. The mon calamari let a wry smile pull his rubber-like lips into an approximate of a human grin as he watched the man's sudden bewilderment. You may take pride into your knowledge of starships Gir, but there are so many out there that you can't possibly know them all or the surprises they hold...

"It has some sort of active camouflage," observed the admiral, "the general colors are quite right, but look right there, and you can see where that oil stain runs down the wall, it doesn't quite come out to the right angle. There's also a reflective sheen there from where the light bounces off the railing over there..."

"Spoil-sport," sighed Salmakk, "the technology is called optical shielding. It's not a perfect facsimile of a true cloaking device, but it works well for blending something in a general environment."

"There's got to be a reason it's not more widespread..."

"Power draw," explained the engineer, "it generally takes power that would normally goes to a ship's shields. In practice, most ships can only run one or the other..."

"Not that big of a drawback if you can't be seen."

"But you can," informed Salmakk, "it's optical shielding. It only works against visual sensors, nothing against full spectrum transceivers or any number of other sensors."

"So it'd show up on a radar screen," noted Gir, "I suppose that would limit it's utility a bit...but still useful. Have you worked out replicating the device?"

"We're very close," said Salmakk, "but it's not quite there yet. Let me show you some of the other progress..."

 

[Gir Quee]

The two walked deeper into the next room of the factory, where the skeletal frame of a starship rested. Gir's eyes immediately darted across the ship's hull, almost instantly recognizing it as the Eidolon-class Transport from the wire-frame conceptual sketches that he had seen. It appeared to have a typical atmospheric shuttle frame, with a roughly tubular fuselage from which a pair of wings sprouted. He eyed them curiously, noting what appeared to be a pair of abnormally large ventilation fans set in the center of each wing. The admiral pointed at one of them.

"What's the purpose of those fans set in each wing?"

"They're turbofans," explained Salmakk, "they're atmospheric engines that were used in the days before repulsorlifts to propel aircraft. The ones we've installed in the wings of the Eidolon are used to help keep it aloft and able to hover without the aid of repulsorlifts."

"Because a repulsorlift field is trackable," noted Gir, "I suppose that should have been obvious to me from the get-go."

"What a lot of times we think is obvious, isn't," said Salmakk, walking closer to the frame of the starship, "this is our second production craft, so it's not quite complete yet, but I thought you might appreciate seeing some of the other internal workings before we move on to the finished craft. Take a look at this..."

 

[Salmakk]

The pair strolled in to walk inside the frame itself, stepping over the exposed spars and frames of the vessel itself. For once, Gir seemed to be a bit more intune with the design itself than Salmakk. He easily stepped through the frames and onto the partially finished floor of the ship's cargo hold with more grace and speed that the engineer ever thought he would be able to muster. The engineer nearly smacked his knee on the frame before clambering onboard the ship's floor.

"You'll notice brother, that nearly none of the frames are straight. They are all built with at least a slight curvature..."

"To lower the signature of any FST returns in case the other stealth systems fail?"

"Well, yes...there's that," admitted Salmakk, "but remember the SkyBlind we just saw? The curvature of that ship's hull helps with the sensor baffling, that much is true, but it goes back to the optical shields as well. It's both easier and harder to project an illusion against a curved hull. It's far easier to conceal projectors within the hull itself so that the projectors can be hidden by other projectors, but getting the exact angle to project the exact surroundings it is around is more difficult. This isn't as much of an issue with the Eidolon because it will be constantly moving most of the time, meaning that it's unlikely that anyone is going to be looking at the exact same spot where the ship is going to constantly be, but it's an issue when the ship is stationary. Perhaps when it is resting on the ground, waiting for its team to come back while it's still visually cloaked. The ship will have a series of passive optic sensors that will record what is on the opposite side, and then have the optical shields project on that side of the ship."

"Like that old holo-projector parlor trick," mused Gir, "suggesting to people far away that it's visually empty..."

"Not just visually," said Salmakk, "though that is a part of it, but with sensor readings as well. That's what the Blackest Night system is for. But that's not why we're in the center of the ship..."

 

[Gir Quee]

Gir glanced around, getting an overall feel for the Eidolon. It seemed smaller than most shuttles, and on one hand, that certainly made sense given its mission profile. Smaller things in general were easier to hide, whether it was a miniature camera or a small military encampment. But the shuttle was still noticeably larger than even heavier superiority starfighters like the X-wing. He guessed that it was fairly close in size to many contemporary starbombers, and given its lines, probably had a similar performance as well. But the man turned his eyes from ship's structure to rest solely on his adopted brother.

"So why are we here?"

"It's the most important part of the ship," said Salmakk, "the cargo bay. You can see over there that there's an airlock that leads to the ship's cockpit."

Gir blinked, "An airlock to the cockpit? In other words, people can deploy from the bay itself into space? Assuming they're using space suits..."

"Exactly. The passengers are the most important part of this design, and why we even studied stealth technology, so we focused heavily on different ways to get them to their destination. By sectioning off the cockpit, we are also giving its passengers the ability to perform HALO jumps from the upper reaches of the atmosphere to a world below. But take a look at the hatch by your feet. That's actually a cotterdam airlock with a built-in hull-cutter."

"To board other starships."

"And installations," added the mon calamari, "if you press the controls situated here, it'll cut a hole through most solid materials given enough time. It might be useful to help infiltrate large buildings like skyscrapers too, if you don't mind being a little noisy..."

"Kind of ruins the point of it being stealthy..."

"I'm working on a sound dampening unit," offered Salmakk, "but that type of engineering is not really any of our fortes. We might have to go to an outside provider that if I can't make any more progress with the prototype I've built..."

"Not an option," said Gir, "not with what we're going to be doing with it. The Eidolon doesn't exist, not even to most of our own employees."

"I know Gir, that's why I haven't talked to anyone else about it, but it would be a nice feature to have."

"We'll have to see what we can work out," mused the admiral, "I suppose we'll have to invent a fairly convincing cover story..."

"Or engineer, pardon my pun, a situation where we'd need one," said Salmakk, "I'd be willing to bet that I can get Gai to make an incredibly loud and obnoxious weapon..."

"Very funny, brother."

 

[Gir Quee]

"But on a more serious note, notice the seats built into the side of the fuselage? There's seating for about a dozen people, but it could carry more if people are willing to stand..."

"I imagine that'd be only for short hops," mused the admiral, "hardly the thing a normal stealth transport would be used for."

"You never know."

"True," admitted Gir, "are those attachment points for securing cargo, or something else?"

"Well, to secure just about anything," said the engineer, "I have to give credit to Gai on this one. He pointed out that there might be a need to move a variety of things around, from speeder bikes, to captured Sithspawn, or arms for rebels. He designed the attachment system so that nearly anything can be secured in here with enough rope or cargo netting. And those panels beneath your feet are actually cargo compartments too. You can't fit anything too big or heavy in them, but it's enough to give people more room for their personal gear besides those overhead storage bins."

"What are those two doors on either side of the cockpit doors...the rooms have to be tiny."

"More like closets," offered Salmakk, "The left one is a refresher room and the right holds the ship's autochef. There's really only enough supplies in it for several weeks of travelling, probably enough to get you through a couple of sectors before you'd have to resupply."

"Doesn't really look like it'd be comfortable to be in something this small that long."

"If you're desperate, perhaps...but practically speaking, you're right. Though it wouldn't be too bad if there was only a handful of people..."

 

[Gir Quee]

"Are you going to arrange a practical test for that?"

"That's almost funny, Gir. The next thing I know, you're going to be wanting to fly the prototype..."

Gir blinked, "Actually..."

"Ha, I got you on that one," said the mon calamari, awkwardly hopping down onto the duracrete floor, "but seriously, the prototype is functional, even with our version of the optical shielding, but I don't think it's systems are stable enough that I'd want you to fly it in case something goes wrong."

"What's not stable with it?"

"The turbofans require a bit of practice to get the hang of before you'd be ready to fly it," said Salmakk, "it handles completely different from them then a normal ship does under repulsorlifts."

"It doesn't have repulsorlifts?" questioned the admiral.

"Oh, well, it does for the ease of moving it around in a ship's hangar and normal, non-steathy flight near ground level," explained Salmakk, "but they're not high performance repulsorlifts at all, capable of moving the ship through the upper reaches of an atmosphere. The ship actually generates most of its mid-level lift with the turbofans at lower speeds, and uses its stabilizers to actually generate lift in the upper atmosphere."

"Sounds more complicated than I thought it'd be..."

"Exactly. But come, let me show you the first Eidolon. It should fueled for us to fly if you'd like."

 

[Gir Quee]

The two of them walked into the next room in line, where a sleek, black starship with muted aerodynamic lines rested. Despite looking a little plump in the middle, Gir found it to be a relatively attractive craft to the eye. As they neared it, Salmakk guided them around to the back of the ship, were the ship's ramp rested on the ground. As they approached, a jumpsuited man in black rose up to greet them.

"Admiral Quee, good to see you again," said the test pilot, extending a hand.

"And you as well," said Gir, grasping it.

He quickly searched for a name to the face, but he couldn't come up with any. The three of them entered the craft, with Gir quickly realizing how spartan the insides of the craft were. There was no attempt to make it look comfortable or refined, though he could appreciate the utilitarian aspects of its design. They passed through the airlock into the cockpit of the vessel, with Ponts gesturing for Gir to take the ship's co-pilot seat as he took the ship's pilot seat. Salmakk hovered behind them, leaning just slightly over Gir's shoulder.

"Lucerne Control, this is Ponts. Ready to launch."

Gir blinked, "We're not going by a callsign?"

"This ship doesn't exist," reminded Salmakk, "the government of Kwookrrr doesn't even know that we're flying this thing in their airspace..."

"You're clear to launch, Ponts."

The hangar doors slid open above them as Ponts ran through the ship's pre-flight checklist. The turbofans built into either wing began to whine, slowly lifting the starship upwards along with its auxiliary repulsorlifts. Ponts flicked several more switches, and even the nose of the craft in front of him seemed to disappear as the optical shields overlayed their projected tones of the floor and walls around them. As the ship rose further into the air, the optical shields changed colors yet again, blending the ship into the sky around them. As they ascended, Ponts began to shift the controls around, and the Eidolon surged forward towards open space.

 

[Gir Quee]

The starship soared through the skies, deftly maneuvering around the few unwary craft that it encountered. Gir had expected the Eidolon to handle a little more quickly, but Salmakk quickly mentioned that the ship suffered flight performance drawbacks when it was running to maximize its stealth performance. The starship soon quickly skimmed through the upper reaches of Wrookrrr's atmosphere before breaking through to the freedom of space. Gir watched as Ponts deftly guided the controls of the starship, taking it on a course towards a much larger starship. Gir looked down at his console, and began to type in various commands, bringing in a passive optic sensor in to home in on the distant speck of gray.

"We're going to the Matthew Lucerne?" said Gir.

"Just buzzing it," informed Salmakk, pulling out a headset comlink and plugging it into the cockpit's console, "let me make a quick call first."

Gir frowned, "And that somehow won't give us away?"

"The ship has an ion scrambler," said the mon calamari, "it'll be next to impossible to tell where the call's coming from. Yes, Matthew Lucerne, this Salmakk down at headquarters. Do you have any ships approaching you currently?"

"Ah...negative sir. There's no-one around us for fifty kilometers. Were you expecting anyone?"

"The customer must be late then, thank you Lucerne," said Salmakk.

Even as he did so, the transport crossed right underneath the flagship of the Labs's corporate fleet. Gir ruefully shook his head.

"That's only slightly deceptive," said Gir, "what will they do when look up that customer?"

"I'll tell them they cancelled," informed Salmakk, rapidly typing in his datapad.

"That's very nice of you."

"I thought so."

 

[Gir Quee]

The craft continued on its path towards the edge of the system, with Ponts expertly guiding the craft around the system patrols in manner not terribly different from when he had tested the Caecius drive system. After a short micro-jump, the ship arrived somewhere near the edge of the system's Oort belt. Large asteroids the size of mountains and many smaller varieties whirled and tumbled about. Gir turned around to face Salmakk.

"What are we doing here?"

"Weapons testing," answered Ponts, flicking several switches, "there isn't anywhere else we can really do it."

The ship's HUD system began to wrap an holo-graphic overlay across part of the ship's canopy. The admiral watched as the test pilot quickly selected several distant rocks and tapped a button. One of the general purpose warhead lauchers built into the side of the ship released a glowing concussion missile which surged forward to obliterate a house-sized rock, spraying the area with metal shards. The sandy haired man cycled to the next weapon, a pair of auto-blasters built into a nose-turret. Twin streams of blaster bolts cut through the debris formed by the first explosion as Ponts and Salmakk tested the turret's fire arcs and the weapon's reliability.

"Not a whole lot of punch," noted Gir.

"It's not really a fighting craft," said Salmakk, "the weapons are intended to either defend the craft, or to provide it the necessarily power to support other operations, such as using autoblasters to clear a landing zone or the concussion missiles to knock out an anti-aircraft system."

"That's completely understandable-"

"There's a sensor sweep running through the area," said Ponts, "it looks like someone picked up on us firing the weapons."

I suppose the weapons aren't cloaked. Gir flipped through several screens, ultimately ending up on the passive FST screen. That kind of sensor ping its using combined with its power suggests that it's a patrol ship of some sort...I suppose this would probably be an area to patrol because it's prime area for smugglers and other criminals to meet without being under the watchful eyes of civilization.

"We should go," suggested Gir.

"Not without giving the searcher something else to chase," said Salmakk, "Ponts, send out a decoy."

"You're the boss," said the pilot, flipping a switch.

A single decoy drone drifted out of the ship's belly, before it began to shimmer. The drone turned into the very image of a YT-1300 before it began to fly deeper into the belt. As it did so, Ponts guided the Eidolon around in a banking maneuver that took the ship away from the decoy as it steamed deeper into the belt. Gir focused his attention on the passive sensor screen, watching as the distant patrol ship vectored in on the decoy. Gir turned his attention to Salmakk.

"That decoy won't give away our involvement, will it?"

Salmakk shook his head, "It's an older but still effective model that's not made by Lucerne Labs. We chose it specifically because any number of people could have gotten their hands on them. It gives the operators of this craft plausible deniability even if the decoy is studied. There's nothing on there that could give our identity or the ship's existence away."

"A mystery then."

"Isn't that what the Eidolon is supposed to be?"

"I suppose you're right on that one."

 

[Gir Quee]

"Still, I wouldn't consider the local customs force to be the most challenging target out there."

Salmakk shrugged, "I would consider it to be among the more common types of forces for this ship to encounter though. it's not meant for battle..."

"True," admitted Gir, "but it could be facing more dangerous or wary opponents."

"You have something in mind?"

"I do," said Gir, "a practical exercise, if you will."

"You have a use for one right now?"

"I do. It won't be too difficult, and I'll have multiple naval reinforcements standing nearby if something goes wrong."

"What is it?"

"Slavers. There's a group that's made a pretty heavily reinforced encampment on the far side of the Terr'skiar system several light years from here," said the man, "we were originally planning on storming the place, but that could lead to more casualties than I'd like."

"And because there are slaves there, you don't want to bomb the place, I'm guessing."

Gir nodded, "I'd rather not kill innocent people if I can help it."

"When will this happen?"

"Several days from now," said Gir, "though obviously, with this ship..."

"You'll need me to be on it," said Ponts, glancing up from the cockpit, "though I'll show you how to fly the ship as much as I can. Then the supreme commander can start giving flying lessons to the troops..."

 

[Gir Quee]

The next day...

Arendal-class Heavy Cruiser Redemption, outskirts of the Terr'skiar System

Standing on the hangar deck, Admiral Quee strolled down the deck with Ponts, who now wore unmarked Republic flight suit. Normally, that would have presented questions from many of the crewmembers, but the Admiral's accompaniment quickly quelled any ideas about enforcing typical Republic regulations. The two of them disappeared behind a makeshift plastene curtain set up to conceal the presence of the Eidolon-class Transport to the rest of the cruiser's crew. A dozen soldiers waited behind curtain for them. Their black battle armor bore no insignia, and the profusion of melee weapons and silenced slugthrowers quickly gave their mission intent away. The lead infiltrator walked up to Gir.

"Everyone is ready sir."

Direct and prepared. I can appreciate that...The man nodded.

"Let's get going," said the admiral, "everyone onboard."

Nearly a dozen men rolled onboard the craft, with Gir and Ponts following them behind to enter the Eidolon through its rear ramp. As they passed through the ship's threshhold, Gir slapped a button on the ship's port side, raising the ship's ramp to sit flush with the rest of its hull. He quickly followed in Pont's footsteps, dodging the strapped down crates of the mission's special equipment and the infiltrators seated at the sides of the ship. As they entered the ship's cockpit, Ponts handed the admiral a headset.

"It's not often I get an admiral for a co-pilot," dryly noted Ponts as he ran through his pre-flight checklist.

Gir himself was running through the co-pilots and weapon's officer checklist, "I wouldn't get too used to it."

"Oh, I know. I'd be worried if I did."

"Why's that?"

"Because that would mean I enlisted," said the other man with shrug.

Gir ruefully shook his head as he made the final adjustments to the headset comlink, "Control, Red One requesting permission to take off."

"Red one, cleared."

As the transport's engines began to whine, Ponts hit a flurry of buttons, bringing up the ship's optical shields and other stealth systems. The transport's colors began to disappear and melt roughly into the shades of the metal deck and plastene curtains around it. It was almost invisible to the visual eye, a necessity for the ship would move to leave the hangar. The man didn't need people observing his stealth craft if its maximum secrecy was going to be maintained. Ponts glanced at the blonde man, who nodded in turn. The ship rose up from the hangar floor before plummeting out of the ventral hangar bay and into space below. After Red One had traveled several hundred meters from the cruiser, it jumped into hyperspace for a relatively short hop to their target.

 

[Gir Quee]

Red One emerged deeper into the system a little over a light-year away from the Redemption. Almost immediately, Ponts activated all of the ship's stealth systems to almost their maximum potential. The optical shields turned the hull of the ship into a black canvas specked with the glinting colors of the distant starlight all around them. The vectrals of the ship's engines became more restricted as it turned to their most stealthy settings to baffle the ion drives. The Blackest Night system was fully engaged, making the ship's hull almost undetectable to their target. They neared an amber-colored planet, and came closer to their target.

Gir rapidly punched in commands into the ship's console, bringing up the passive sensor screen. He could see the faint signatures of another ship's sensor arrays methodically sweeping through the area. After collecting enough info, he was able to triangulate their rough source, which he promptly handed over to Ponts, who then guided their ship closer to the source of the sensor pinging. Gir saw an ablong tan ovoid in the distance, and brought in the ship's ESTs to zoom in on it. He eyed it curiously.

"Slave ship by the looks of it."

Ponts glanced at it, "You know that how?"

"Zygerrian make," said the admiral, rising from his seat, "and the location, in orbit around the encampment. We'll have to adjust our plans accordingly. It sounds like the traders arrived earlier than what our intelligence predicted."

"Wonderful."

The blonde man stepped through the airlock into the hold of the Eidolon to discuss the new findings with the mission leader.

 

[Gir Quee]

Propelled by short bursts of its chemical engines, Red One silently drifted towards the Aurore-class freighter. Finally, the Republic starship settled in to hover just above the slave ship and match its current pace before almost attaching to the other craft silently. Gir spared a glance at Ponts. I have to admit, Salmakk, you picked a good pilot. The pilot turned his gaze back onto the admiral.

"When you're ready sir."

Gir nodded and began to type in commands into his console. A slight whine began to filter in from the hold of the vessel as the hull-cutter quickly cut through the freighter's hull plating. He heard a brief clank as the now cut piece of hull plating fell down below. He quickly rose up from his seat to join the Infiltrators as they boarded the other vessel, taking care to activate his personal shield and draw his blaster pistol. As he landed on the other ship's deck, he heard a brief gargling sound. He casts his eyes upwards to watch a Zygerrian struggling to grasp the garrote that one of the infiltrators had wrapped around his neck. Gir rose, pointed his pistol, and promptly shot the alien with a blue stun bolt. The infiltrator released his hold of the being, letting his body fall onto the ground unceremoniously with a dull thud. The same infiltrator fell in behind the admiral as he walked towards the vessel's bridge.

"Most of these ships only have two crewmembers at the most," said Gir quietly, "in order to maximize their profit, so let's hope that's still the case here..."

The two Republic soldiers entered the small bridge with pistols drawn, but there was no-one else present. Apparently the Zygerrian they had encountered had been the one running the ship. Probably went to check out the sound of the hull-cutter...Gir settled into the pilot's chair and began to type in various commands, bringing up all of the information he could find on the vessel and its contents. So according to the ship's records, no-one else should be onboard...He flicked his headset comlink on.

"One to team, any living beings found on the ship aside from that first one?"

All of the members of the team checked in, but none of them had found anyone else onboard. Apparently he was coming in to pick up the slaves on the surface...but maybe we can use that to our advantage...Gir began to type several other commands into the ship's console.

 

[Gir Quee]

"That's devious."

"It's my job," said the admiral, "even slavers look after their own."

"Or so you hope."

The two men reclined in the seats of the still shrouded Eidolon, eying the swirling atmosphere of the world below. Beneath, the slave ship Erinyes incessantly broadcasted an automated distress signal. Already, the scopes of the Eidolon transport had seen several specks that were ships likely trying to see if it was a trap before they approached any closer. But with everyone but the zygerrian, who they had imprisoned in one of his own cells, currently sat shielded from enemy sensors by the Eidolon's hull. It would only appear that the slaver was by himself on the vessel. Several of the specks rapidly drew in closer. Gir eyed them intently.

"Starfighters," muttered Ponts.

Gir nodded in agreement, "Probably scouts of some sort...Checking to see if the scene is really safe..."

The two starfighters surged past the transport, briefly circling the vessel before jetting off towards a larger vessel, which Gir quickly identified as yet another Aurora-class freighter. The new freighter turned to dock with the Erinyes, Gir turned his attention to the infiltrators.

"Newcomers, get ready..."

A clank revereberated through the hull of the Erinyes and into the cargo bay of the Eidolon-class transport....

 

[Gir Quee]

Gir drew his own sidearm, a Tenloss-built pistol, and warily squated down before shuffling over to the hold of the Eidolon transport. The team of infiltrators had arrayed themselves around the airlock, waiting to jump down and ambush any of the would-be rescuers. The man heard an alien language begin to filter out of the Aurore-class freighter's hold as the slavers explored their comrade's craft. Without warning, the first of the infiltrators plunged down to land on a zygerrian's neck. It made a sickening crackling sound before the man turned on to his next prey. The other infiltrators quickly followed suite, jumping down to launch a surprise attack on the slavers. Considering the amount of violence going on, it was surprisingly quiet.

Gir winced as he flicked the safety of his blaster off. They're crazy, and the slavers are definitely unlucky. Ponts's voice eeked in from the cockpit.

“Boss, those fighters are coming around again...and their approach vector is a little bit more dead on to us.”

The admiral abandoned all pretense of personal stealth as he jumped back into the cockpit. He quickly looked at their visual scopes. Sure enough, he could see a pair of snubfighters swooping down on the trio of linked ships. They might be onto us if they have good sensors, they might swee that suddenly there's more lifeforms on the freighter than they are supposed to be...He rapidly began to punch in commands to the ship's weapon systems. As the starfighters neared the transports once more, a pair of orange seeking missiles leapt out of the Eidolon and surged at the slavers's fighters. The first was caught totally unaware, and promptly smashed right into the warhead. The trailing fighter had the time to start to pull up, but the missile was far too fast and agile for it be avoided. It too turned into a fiery fireball that quickly burned out.

Gir snorted, “Let's hope they don't have any more ships...”

 

[Gir Quee]

“The vessel is secured. There were no slaves on it either.”

“This is where you pack the ships with explosives, and send it down on auto-pilot to them, right?” half-joked Ponts.

“If this was a One Sith base, probably,” admitted Gir, “but it's not, it goes without saying that we can't simply blow up innocent people who have been the victims of such a horrific crime such as slavery.”

“So what's the move, use it to infiltrate the camp?” asked the test-pilot.

“No, use it to draw them out of the camp some more. I'm going to set the latest captured freighter on an auto-pilot course to crash nearby the camp.”

“Try to draw them out of it,” guessed the lead infiltrator.

“Exactly,” said Gir, “we'll follow the crash ship in this transport. When their freighter crashes, hopefully they'll go investigate. Ponts and I will drop all of you off near the base, see what you can ascertain about the location, and if you can secure a way in, great. Meanwhile, if Ponts and I will create a distraction by strafing the rescuers.”

“You're cold...”

“It's a war,” said Gir, “everyone's cold in their own ways. At least if they're going to live.”

 

[Gir Quee]

One hour later...

The Eidolon surged into the atmosphere, surreptitiously following the doomed Aurore-class Freighter towards the surface. As they passed through the gray clouds of the world, Ponts spared a glance at Gir, who shrugged in turn. The world's rocky surface mottled by frequent bursts of plant life was beginning to slowly come into view for the two men.

“This world does not look inviting,” started Ponts.

“No, it doesn't,” agreed Gir, surveying the dreary world, “but then again, if it did, there would probably be more people than slavers and their slaves here...three more minutes to go...”

The next three minutes seemed to drag, like they did when Gir found himself in some bureaucratic meeting a government watchdog group. As his chrono counted down to zero though, the Aurore freighter began to rapidly plunge before it made what almost lookedlike a bad crash landing. It toppled and wobbled about as its hull briefly skimmed the ground before it cartwheeled into a large formation of rocks. Pieces of its hull went flying throughout the air even as the wreckage began to leak out an ashy column of smoke into the air. But the Eidolon flew past the ship's remains towards the base itself, a little under a kilometer away from the crash site. Gir pointed out a pair metallic objects running on the ground below.

“Look at that,” pointed out Gir, “they've already got a landspeeder and a speeder bike heading out. It had to be a deafening sound to them.”

Ponts took the craft in a gentle curve to land the craft behind a clump of tank-sized bushes. Certain that were well-concealed, Gir go gave the go ahead for the infiltrators to depart from the craft. As soon as they had, the Eidolon vanished once more before rising up into the air again.

 

[Gir Quee]

The Eidolon hovered on its twin turbofans as it flew at what normally would have almost been treetop level on many worlds. But this world did not have trees. The brush that crawled up and around the rocky world presented no flying hazards to Ponts, but still, Gir could sense that the man was not happy.

“What's wrong?” questioned Gir.

“I'm a test pilot, not a fighter...”

“You knew when you signed up for this mission that there might be combat.”

“Yeah, I did. I just didn't think that I'd really have a part to play in killing people.”

Gir nodded as he began to activate the ship's targeting computers, “I don't have a solution to that. But you are on the right side, if that helps at all.”

“It does...a little.”

The admiral took control of the ship's autoblasters and turned their turret to point at the parked landspeeders. He glanced at his wrist chrono. It should be about time. He squeezed the trigger of the weapon, releasing twin streams of blaster bolts which quickly tore up the Sorosuub-built landspeeder and completely incinerated the speeder bike. He swept the autoblasters around, taking aim at the various heat signatures that were scrambling everywhere after he had attacked the vehicles. Many of them fell under the attacks, but several of the slavers wedged themselves into positions that he could not easily reach from their current position. He glanced Ponts, but the man was turning pale. He's not up for this...

“Let's pull back,” said Gir, “we've done our part.”

 

[Gir Quee]

"Another contact, coming in," announced Ponts.

The Eidolon circled around the base, with Gir occasionally taking potshots with the autoblasters at any of the slavers that revealed themselves. But few had, and Gir was almost certain that several of them were trying play dead at the crash site. But with the flames and heat from the destroyed vehicles and where he had shot before, he was finding the thermal scopes being less than useful for targeting, and it was still too dark out to use the standard targeting sensors. He switched his sensor screen to view the readouts of the passive FSTs, oftentimes known colloquially as radar. While he knew a few ship models by their FST signatures, the one approaching him he did not. Nor did it match the ones of the Aurore-class freighters that had encountered thus far. But it's moving faster than most freighters in the atmosphere, might well be a fighter...but it could be a very heavily souped up freighter...it's definitely the right size for one...Ponts cleared his throat.

"How much longer are we going to be here?"

"Assuming this ship isn't too much of a threat, a while. We drew out most of the slavers with the decoy team. The infiltration team has nearly killed or captured every slaver left on the base. I was hoping to wait it out until the Redemption and her troops arrive to take control of the scene."

"How long is that?"

"A half hour."

"You really want to hold out then."

"This new ship might completely unravel that plan though," said Gir, watching the sensor signature streak towards them.

It suddenly flashed into view past their viewport, and immediately shattered the admiral's expectations. It wasn't a highly modified freighter at all. Instead, it was a very large assault fighter. A classic Preybird to Gir's eyes, though it could be a more modern derivative of it. He flipped through several screens as it too started to circle around the area. It's not broadcasting any transponder codes...He flipped to the targeting screens again. Ponts groaned.

"That thing is a whole lot faster and stronger than us," warned the sandy-haired man.

"It's all about positioning", replied Gir, "take us up another fifty meters and let's hover in place."

Ponts relunctantly complied as Gir began to reset the weapon switches and protocols. As the investigating fighter neared them, Gir rapidly tapped both triggers, unleashing all of the ship's warheads at once. They briefly plummeted before streaking off towards the Preybird. Brief laser bursts lashed out from the fighter towards one of the concussion missiles and detonated it. The resulting explosion caught and detonated another missile he had just fired. A waste of credits, but the other two missiles streaked past and smashed into the fighter's left wing, nearly disintegrating it at its wing root. The unstabilized fighter began to spin rapidly even as it slowly coasted towards the ground. He watched the fighter's cockpit cover fly off as the ejector seat shot up into the air, freeing the fighter's pilot from the stricken craft. He eyed the figure warily. That'll be one we'll have to interrogate...but this mission is a success.