Kashyyyk Me Outside, How 'Bout That?

[Jethro Rekali]

[member="Angel"] [member="Honus Teach"] [member="Valae Kitra"]

“All right, folks, here's the job. Anonymous contractor, wink-wink, nudge-nudge, wants us to poke the Jedi a bit. Kashyyyk's the target - yeah, the new Silver capital, but stuff’s still getting set up. Now, we can't hit the Jedi Temple, both because stomping kids doesn't sit well with me and because there's apparently a dome shield the size of a Death Star. Instead, we’re hitting a mountain base that might or might not be completed. Antarian Rangers, I'm told.

“We're going straight hit-and-run. We get bogged down too long, we die and don't get paid.”

***

A mismatched squadron hit realspace in Kashyyyk’s upper atmosphere. Jethro Rekali toggled comms and S-foil actuators. His modded B-wing rotated around the cockpit until the main hull pointed straight down. A low-grade sensor mask shimmered to life - just enough to slow down enemy targeting on his bomber.

“This is Spector One. Mountain base is five minutes ahead. S-foils in attack position. They shouldn't have time to scramble much, but watch out for stray patrol ships, ground guns, and Jedi weirdness. Spector Squadron: enjoy.”

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

Allies: [member="Cassius Droma"] [member="Asaraa Vaashe"] [member="Jerit Kolomor"] [member="Valae Kitra"]
Enemies: [member="Jethro Rekali"] [member="Angel"] [member="Honus Teach"]

"General, suspicious contacts in upper atmosphere"

"Open a channel to them, place the base's SAMs on yellow alert; activate the signal de-scrambler!"

"Roger, roger"

For a while she might have been on Kashyyyk to defend the Silver Jedi homeland should it be attacked by other dark-sided parties in the Great Galactic War, while a few brave souls were underway in the Metharian Nebula in an attempt to breach the First Order blockade. Jessica knew that she couldn't put all the faction's eggs in that basket, else Kashyyyk be vulnerable to attacks from the Sith and their allies. In a newly-established mountain base, she would be there for the first time, not realizing that perhaps those suspicious contacts in the upper atmosphere may well be... hostile. She just needs to be asking questions beforehand. But she also knew that the SAMs would be readied sequentially if that was necessary. Here she might have a chance to have those brand-new Hailfire-X droids used in a combat situation if it came to that, knowing that the Hailfire-Xs' missiles will have a much longer range than a Hwacha's but also be less maneuverable due to the projectile's greater size. Now that the channel was open to the lead unidentified craft, she issued that one warning that is customary when the IFF transponder readings seemed suspicious:

"Channel open" the communications officer reported in, opening a channel to [member="Jethro Rekali"], hoping that they would heed the warning.

"Unidentified craft, this is General Med-Beq of the Silver Jedi Army. You have ten seconds to identify yourselves or you will be shot down!"

Spoiler: SAMs

2 Hailfire-X droids
3 Hwacha MLRS

 

[Tanaski Yumi]

Tana though being apart of the order for a few months had yet to fully explore the entirety of the Silver Jedi compounds on the tropical and tree abundant world, such knowledge coming to the young Padawans attention when attempting to give a tour for a new, though slightly odd initiate. Needless to say things became a bit awkward, Tana not really know the new layout of the different complex did not help things either, making for a much longer the necessary and not very accurate guide of the new Jedi capital.

What better way to make sure said event does not happen again then mind map out almost every inch of the current facilitates, even the mountain military base away from the main temple, besides, you may wind up with a military nut as a Padawan who's first request would be to see such a base. So far it had been a breeze, except for the odd check point here and there requesting identification and what not, kind of a pain, but necessary, didn't want some Sith assassin making it into the base.

"I need to see your ID Padawan"

"Yer Yer I know gotta ke-" alarms blared away before Tana finished speaking, the guards and personal around taking an altered stance. "What the, are we under attack, who would be stupid enough to do that"?

"I don't know, but we have to go into lock down, you will have to stay here until the threat is over Padawan".

*Siiiight*, "Fine, not like I had anything else to do today".

[member="Jessica Med-Beq"] l [member="Jethro Rekali"]

 

[Mia Monroe]

Under different circumstances, Angel might have opted out of this mission, but things had changed. She'd been raised under the Flag of the Levatines and the Silver Jedi, and when war had come, they had up and left her homeworld and dozens of others to fend for themselves. So she had a modicum of bitterness towards them for their abandonment, it wasn't such a big issue that she would label all Jedi under the same category, she'd been raised better than that. But to have a chance to take a shot? Well she wasn't going to say no.

"Copy that, Spector One." Angel replied with a grin. Eyes flicking over her sensor array. "I'd challenge you to a race, but with that lump of metal it'd be an easy win for me." She slid the A-wing into formation on his starboard side, finger itching and eyes alert for the first sign of trouble.

It came in the voice of a very clear threat. "Y'know, I remember Jedi being far more welcoming than that." she commented, readying her concussion missiles.

[member="Jethro Rekali"] [member="Honus Teach"] [member="Tanaski Yumi"] [member="Jessica Med-Beq"]

 

[Commander Firestorm]

Suddenly a large ship shot out of hyperspace in the upper atmosphere, a Venator-class Star Destroyer, GA and SJO markings on it, its turbolasers and point-defense lasers traversing around to face the hostiles, the tractor beams also warming up. The ship's hangar bay opening, apparently ready to dispense fighters.

[member="Angel"]
[member="Tanaski Yumi"]
[member="Jessica Med-Beq"]
[member="Jethro Rekali"]

 

[Jethro Rekali]

[member="Jessica Med-Beq"] [member="Tanaski Yumi"] [member="Angel"] [member="Commander Firestorm"]

"General Med-Beq, my name's Rekali. Thanks for committing to not shoot us if we identify ourselves."

Sensors outlined what looked like a handful of mobile SAM emplacements, wedged into the mountain terrain with the base. Jethro sucked his teeth in thought and depressed the bomb bay control. His main bay held flame carpets, huge canisters designed to spread incendiary substances over a gigantic area. The flames themselves wouldn't do a ton of damage to the base, maybe not even the SAM vehicles, but direct damage wasn't the plan.

As the mountain chain lit up, huge swaths of snow began to turn to sludge or boil away. Avalanches of half-molten slush poured off the nearest peaks in all directions. Ideally, some of that would glop the base ahead, or shove SAM emplacements off a cliff or something. Gigantic clouds of steam offered Spector Squadron some concealment. Further weapons fire - cannons, warheads - lanced out to engage the SAMs.

At which point, a Venator-class Star Destroyer appeared directly overhead. Jethro hissed. "Spector One to all hands - break!"

 

[Jon Lekka]

[member="Jethro Rekali"] [member="Jessica Med-Beq"] [member="Cassius Droma"]

Jon was a horrible pilot. Was it his relative lack of experience that made him feel like he was at risk of dropping out of the sky at any moment? Maybe. He'd piloted ships before, but flying an A-Wing was much different than a shuttle. Just twitching the joystick made his fighter jerk wildly around. As annoying as the steep learning curve was, Jon felt almost obligated to learn how to fly a fighter. After spending three years galavanting around the galaxy, he felt like he had done the Order a disservice by not helping in the effort against the First Order. That's why upon his return to Kashyyyk, he immediately got to work learning how to fly. This was his third time flying an A-Wing, so it was only typical that the whole planet would go on priority alert his third time flying a extremely volatile starfighter.

Jon toggled his comms, and reached out to the Cassius Droma, the pilot helping to train Jon and other Jedi in dogfighting. "Padawan Droma, should we be worried about the fact that there's a priority alert going on right now?"

 

[Tanaski Yumi]

The base shook as some kind of explosive or what not rocked the main structure, non military personnel ducking under door ways and other strong structural point, but it did not seem that the bombs, or what ever was being dropped on them was doing much damage, a diversion perhaps? or was their target something else? His questions seemed to be answered at a low rumbling sound that seemed to be getting closer and closer, louder and louder, "Are they trying to start an avalanche and burry the whole base? who the hell are we fighting anyways"?

"I We have yet to receive any confirmation, but if that's the case we should shut down the hanger bays and evacuate everyone into the lower levels, that means you too".

"Like hell I'm missing out on this also ain't no one washing my fighter away in some snow storm, that girls a classic". Tana proceeded to leap over the security check point, headed back the way her came and towards the hanger bay, maybe the snow would not get inside, maybe it would, he was not about to test it out though.

"Hey get back here, your not alo-", the security guard was not able to finish his sentence as Tana turned around, giving him a rather sinister glare, "Oh I'm sorry, but what part about 'like hell I'm missing out on this' don't you under stand, hmmmmmm, that what a thought". The guard stood a little shock at the Padawan sudden change in personality, ever so allowing the young Jin to race back down the hall way towards the hanger bay, "That kids odd".

[member="Jon Lekka"] l [member="Jethro Rekali"] l [member="Commander Firestorm"] l [member="Angel"] l [member="Jessica Med-Beq"]

 

[Honus Teach]

[member="Jethro Rekali"] [member="Jessica Med-Beq"] [member="Tanaski Yumi"] [member="Commander Firestorm"] [member="Jon Lekka"] [member="Angel"]

Jedi, Sith, Ren, Mandalorians, Bantha poodoo all those things had a whole lot in common all of them made a big stink and did a whole lot of not a damn thing for anyone. That's what Ol' Teach thought anyway. Well, the poodoo could be dried and used for fire kindling or fertilizer, so, it had one up on the rest.

He threw his E-wing into evasive maneuvers and remembered why he prefered flying in space. The air resistance in atmosphere cut his speed and maneuverability more than he would have liked. He armed his proton torpedos and targeted the base as Spector one rained fire on the area.

The call to break came and Honus would be happy to do just that but first things first. He pushed a little red button and "fired from the hip". The proton torpedos burst out and headed for the base and what the man hoped was the hanger or something like it.

He broke away banking a hard left and just about plastered himself into his seat as the ships engines roared. The left took him in a tight loop and he began to climb and caught a good peak at the old star destroyer. He always wanted to shoot one down with a fighter. Maybe, today would be the day.

 

[Cassius Droma]

​

Allies: [member="Jon Lekka"] | [member=”Sko’saht”] | [member="Jessica Med-Beq"] | [member="Commander Firestorm"]
Enemies: [member="Jethro Rekali"] | [member="Angel"] |[member="Honus Teach"]
Directly Engaging: Jethro

After forming Jade Squadron, Cassius hadn’t expected to take on more responsibilities like the occasional flight school for newer pilots. Seeing as how A-wings, particularly the RZ-X A-wing, was more reserved for Ace pilots, he typically wanted his students to have a little more skill when first coming to him. Not everything worked out as planned, though, and he was leading a bunch of rookies around in RZ-1s while he was in the RZ-X.

It was a typical maneuvering flight so far – they were only a small flight of four fighters. He was leading them through the mountains to show them just what A-wings were capable of. There was a little surprise planned at the end as well in the form of “friendly” opposition played by a few other Silvers.

They wouldn’t get that far, however.

A small blip on his radar caught his attention. It was small, fleeting – almost looked like a glitch. From there, everything seemed to happen at once. A priority alert came through, and one of his students asked him over comm if they should be concerned. Just as he asked, Cassius had flipped on the advanced sensors on the A-wing, and saw a series of small blips heading for the mountain base.

“We absolutely should be,” Cassius responded, flicking a variety of switches to rev up his weapons and shields. “Look alive gentlemen, weapons hot. This is not a drill. Follow my lead and stay close.”

Cassius pushed his engines to their near limit, zipping between the mountains to get back to the mountain base. As he did so, he radioed back to Silver Rest, hoping to scramble some more of Jade Squadron to come help. He didn’t expect much, as the majority of his pilots were spending time with their families for Life Day, but if he could get a flight of them out here, they could hopefully take care of this.

By the time he arrived, the fighters were already going for the SAM sites – and a giant Venator-class Star Destroyer had shown up and scrambled them a little bit. In a cursory visual scan, Cassius could see that it was a hodge-podge of different fighters. Certainly not an organized fighting force, more likely hired mercenaries or pirates. Quickly, he tried to determine just who he should go after first.

“Pick a target and go for them,” Cassius said to the rest of the pilots flying with him. “I’m gunning for the enemy B-wing.” It made sense. He was an interceptor, so part of his job was to go shoot down bombers, and that B-wing could cause a lot of damage if left unchecked. Heading straight for it, he locked on a concussion missile and let it loose, ready to follow up with his laser cannons if the missile was avoided or otherwise dealt with.

 

[Commander Firestorm]

The Venator's main hangar opened and a few squadrons came flying out of it, being led by what looked like a heavily modified LAAT/i gunship, apparently modified for space combat and travel.

[member="Cassius Droma"]
[member="Honus Teach"]
[member="Tanaski Yumi"]
[member="Jon Lekka"]
[member="Jethro Rekali"]
[member="Angel"]
[member="Jessica Med-Beq"]

 

[Kat Decoria]

Kat grabbed her hydrospanner and got to work on a hyperdrive for a damage ship. Another boring day as a mechanic, she was starting to miss the action and fighting that normally wasn't an interest to her. Perhaps it was the fact her job was just now repetitive, fix this damaged vehicle, make this run smoother, make my gun shoot faster. Nothing was a challenge. Also likely was the stories the other Rangers shared when they were drinking, boasting about kills or how they single-handedly won the war. Most outrageous but trying to boast that you fixed a leaking hyperdrive that no one noticed and nearly ruined a fine cruiser. Doesn't sound as nearly as impressive...

As soon as sirens signal an on coming threat, Kat snapped her head to attention. Jumping out of her workspace, she watched as pilots headed to their ships and engaged in the possible threat. Coming here to Kashyyyk. Really? Seemed a dumb idea to Kat, attacking a well defended world, a home world for the Silvers. Surely attacking one of the border worlds would have higher chance of success. However, that point was moot, they were here and they needed to be stopped.

A blast hit the hangar, ships were set ablazed and the blast sent Kat back several metres. Landing hard, her breath whipped out of her lungs as she lifted up to full height.

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

Allies: [member="Commander Firestorm"] [member="Jon Lekka"] [member="Cassius Droma"] [member="Tanaski Yumi"] [member="Kat Decoria"]
Enemies: [member="Honus Teach"] [member="Jethro Rekali"] [member="Angel"]

On the one hand, the enemy managed to cause a landslide near the base, on the other hand, the weapons-tight protocol that surrounded a yellow alert caused the base to go to red alert once the proton torpedo hit an area near the hangar, rocking it and causing some damage to several craft that didn't yet take off. The arrival of the Unbroken was most welcome here, and its fighter complement would hopefully being able to drive them off. That was, in itself, a rather big move. With the enemy fighters now confirmed as hostile, a dozen different missiles were fired at several fighters, with the lead pilots, Honus, Jethro and Angel receiving each one concussion missile and one proton rocket, and the remainder of the projectiles being fired at their wingmen. What would they hope to achieve by attacking us here? she thought, but it was likely their employers were somehow related to the Metharian Nebula blockade or rivals of the United Trade Conglomerate. That is, the First Order was the prime suspect in her mind. And yet, as they opened fire at the incoming fighters, the SAMs were also on the move in an attempt to avoid the worst effects of the avalanche.

Spoiler: SAMs

2 Hailfire-X droids
3 Hwacha MLRS

 

[St0rmSlaSh]

Jerit was in the hangar with his master, [member="Jyoti Nooran"]. They were both upgrading Master Kitra's old ship, The Tumbleweed. He had to admit, it was a pretty cool thing to do. Looking at a ship's internal structure and see how every parts helps to make the spaceship whole, it was truly a sight to see for someone as interested in electronics like Jerit.

As he was handing some tools to his Master, he heard ships... nearing the base?

"You hear that, Master?"

Jerit raced to the opening of the hangar and sure enough, there were unknown ships closing in on the base. He could not believe it. Who was stupid enough to attack the base that belonged to Jedi? The trespassers were either super ballsy, or just plain stupid. He concluded that they were indeed the bold type when he sensed something huge come into near the Mountain Rest. A Venator Class Star Destroyer.

Is this an attack on the Silver Rest?

Jerit raced back to his master to inform her of what was happening, although she could probably sense the objects the same as Jerit had.

"Should we get in this thing and help? I do not think Master Kitra would mind."

By now, the alarms were sounding and people were scrambling to their fighters. Jerit was more than eager now to get into the sky. He had flown before in his personal freighter, the Thunder Phoenix. With these enemies in the sky, this could wrought an opportunity for Jerit to get some practice for fighting in the air.

Those bastards don't know what's coming for them!

 

[Deslin Vegar]

Not even a few days into the Rangers and were already being engaged. Wow. More of the reason to start right now. Deslin had rushed from the HQ to the hanger, and saw his notorious X-Wing. It was there first space battle he has ever been. Sure enough, he was very nervous. The ring of the alarm, the footsteps of men rushing to the starfighters, and the constant sounds of engines roaring to life made Deslin more and more excited to be in the action.

He adjusted his pilot helmet on his head and opened the cockpit to his X-Wing, jumping in and securing himself inside. He ignited the engines, and scanned the hanger for a second, as the hanger was rumbling an awful lot, causing Deslin to get a little more nervous about taking off. But it was his first time, why not try to get some experience under your belt. So he took off, out the hanger into the atmosphere of Kashyyyk. He was getting closer from getting out of the atmosphere. Deslin was so ready to take part of his first battle ever, as a Ranger.

 

[Jethro Rekali]

[member="Jon Lekka"][member="Tanaski Yumi"][member="Honus Teach"][member="Cassius Droma"][member="Commander Firestorm"][member="Kat Decoria"][member="Jessica Med-Beq"][member="Jerit Kolomor"][member="Deslin Vegar"][member="Angel"]

Proton rockets were the kind of munition you used against capital ships or heavy transports - useless against starfighters. The low-yield concussion missiles, though, were another story. As Spector Squadron broke in all directions, three of the mismatched mercenary fighters vanished in fireballs. The befuddled proton rockets continued on, either to hit the huge Star Destroyer immediately above, or fall back to the mountains, or explode in the newly arrived clouds of fighters.

Jethro had more immediate concerns. Two concussion missiles - one from the ground, one from a patrol A-wing - depleted his shields to a threadbare 10%.

"Angel, One. A-wing on me. Scrape him off please."

He hauled for clear sky.

 

[Valae Heavenshield]

Allies: [member="Jon Lekka"] | Sko’saht | [member="Jessica Med-Beq"] | [member="Commander Firestorm"] | [member="Cassius Droma"] | [member="Deslin Vegar"]
Enemies: [member="Jethro Rekali"] | [member="Angel"] |[member="Honus Teach"]

​

In the hangar at Silver Landing, Faye sat cross-legged next to her A-wing. Jade Leader had taken out a couple of new people, and she was set to join them a bit later on to provide some friendly opposition. It was going to be an easy gig, so she was taking advantage of a quiet moment by herself. Well, she wasn’t totally alone here in the hangar – there were a couple of others down the line. In fact, they seemed to be working on an old freighter. Faye was curious, but she needed to stick close to her fighter.

The call would be coming any moment, and she didn’t want to miss it.

After all, the last thing she wanted to do was disappoint. The teen cradled her datapad, watching some videos by some of the newest Seoulian musicians. These dance moves would be all the craze, and had she been alone, she probably would have been attempting to emulate the movements. But for now, she settled for swaying back and forth in tune with the music.
Suddenly, Jade Leader’s voice came over the comm. However, it wasn’t quite the call she was expecting. Panic seized Faye for a brief moment, and she then tossed the datapad back into her bag. Clambering up the step ladder, she jumped into the cockpit. After strapping in and giving her systems a quick check, she powered her A-wing up and took off.

“Jade Leader, I’m on my way!” She responded, heading towards his flight’s coordinates.

The sky of Kashyyyk was normally wide open – but not today. With the mountains rising to greet her in the distance, she steeled her nerves, getting ready to assist.

 

[Eugen Aker]

Location: Silver Rest
Allies: [member="Faye Demos"] [member="Deslin Vegar"] [member="Jerit Kolomor"] [member="Jessica Med-Beq"] [member="Kat Decoria"] [member="Commander Firestorm"] [member="Cassius Droma"] [member="Tanaski Yumi"] [member="Jon Lekka"]
Opposition: [member="Jethro Rekali"] [member="Honus Teach"] [member="Angel"]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2W8RgRa9us4&t​

"Soldering laser," Jyoti requested from under the cockpit's console. She had spent the better part of an hour pre-wiring some new avionic components for improved navigation and targeting, and now came time connect it all together.

She gingerly accepted the laser tool in one hand, then wiped a few beads of sweat from her temple with the other. With surgical precision, she went right down the line of connection fusing them together with the blue microlaser in quick succession. Once finished, she pulled herself out from under the console, then plopped back into one of those new comfy bucket seats she had installed earlier in the day with Jerit.

"Now for the moment of truth." She leaned forward to toggle some switches, feeding power back into the cockpit. Moments later, glass panels came alive, spewing out all sorts of readouts as the shipboard neural net integrated the new components into its operation.

It would take some time to see how the Tumbleweed played with the upgrades, but the system had initialized without a hitch, so it was a good sign to start. She was ready to break then and enjoy long lunch with Jerit, when she started getting all sorts of warning pings over her neural link. Then came the sound of air sirens.

"I hear it!" she shouted to Jerit outside, waving him back over to the Tumbleweed. "Take us up! I'll man the ion turret."

There weren't many attack craft based on the campus proper, in keeping with its image as a sanctuary and learning institution, so the Tumbleweed was one of their best fighting options currently on hand.

Jerit had been a bubble of emotions as he sensed danger, but the Echani remained cool as ice as she climbed up into the canopy of the gunner turret. Raids had long become routine for the Jedi Master; in her line of work playing galactic police, one just accepted someone would come around to kick in your front door every now and then for retaliation. For her, it was little different than pest control.

"Once you're in the air, try to keep us to the outside the enemy formation," she instructed over internal comms. "We're a big target, so we don't want to expose ourselves too much by flying into the middle of a furball."

 

[Tanaski Yumi]

Tana continued to race down the hallways and into the main hanger as several more detonations rocked the base, the young Padawan bumping into several people along the was due to the sudden rocking, they were defiantly trying to do some damage now he just hopped no ceiling, keeping a close eye on the object hanging above. As thus Tana had lost track of his own direction, long having entered the hanger bay, but still not slowing down, unfortunately heading straight for another Padawan that seemed preoccupied landing over his own ship.

"Ga"! Tana let out a surprised yelp as he bumped into Jedi Padawan [member="Jerit Kolomor"], with enough force to probably knock them both down, that was if Jerit had not noticed, though the young Jin, despite looks, was not the lightest person around, so either way he tumbled to the ground either way, almost performing a front flip in the process, though luckily remaining unharmed. As quickly as it had happened he had sprung back to his feet, performing several apologetic bows to whoever was the victim of his carelessness, "Ahhh, Mōshiwakearimasen, watashi o yurush'itekudasai"!!

The suddenness of the accident and current dilemma made Tana forget about the language barrier, the youngster just naturally returning to his mother tongue, quickly sprouting the apology in more a ramble than anything else, unaware they probably no one around would understand what he was saying.

[Translation-sorry, please excuse me]

[member="Jyoti Nooran"] l [member="Jethro Rekali"] l [member="Faye Demos"] l [member="Deslin Vegar"] l [member="Jessica Med-Beq"] l [member="Commander Firestorm"] l [member="Jon Lekka"]

 

[Jessica Med-Beq]

Allies: [member="Commander Firestorm"] [member="Jon Lekka"] [member="Cassius Droma"] [member="Tanaski Yumi"] [member="Kat Decoria"] [member="Faye Demos"] [member="Jyoti Nooran"]
Enemies: [member="Honus Teach"] [member="Jethro Rekali"] [member="Angel"]

"Hailfires, hold your fire, proton rockets aren't going to work"

With the Hailfire droids holding their fire, leaving only the lighter SAMs firing a volley of six missiles, even the arrival of friendly craft in the airspace around that battered mountain base did not fully deal with the enemy raiding party, whom she fully expected to be employed by at least one of the belligerents of the Great Galactic War. But they were not First Order, no more than they were Galactic Empire regulars, since they were not using E-Wings or B-Wings in combat, no more than they were using fighters with hyperdrives; it was entirely possible the Sith Empire regulars could have used them, since she knew SE attack craft procurement was uneven at times. But she had good reason to suspect that, in fact, it was more likely to be some hastily-hired party than any real organized squadron. Hopefully those missiles would keep the enemy craft on their toes, with one missile being fired at each of the enemy lead pilots, and the remaining missiles being fired at their wingmen. May we find out who hired those pilots, she thought, while mapping their crash sites in the Force.

"We want some units combing the forests for downed enemy pilots; I want them alive for interrogation"

Spoiler: SAMs

2 Hailfire-X droids
3 Hwacha MLRS