Rogue Imperial Pirates

[Klesta]

"To all units in range: this is the Magic School Bus: We are under attack by pirates, apparently going under the name Rogue Imperial Warband! Transmitting coordinates now" the communications officer of the Magic School Bus transmitted on open frequencies from Vjun.

After the defeat of the pocket of rogue imperials in the Copperline sector and later, on Faldos, many of the surviving Rogue Imperials returned to the service of the Galactic Empire or the First Order. Others turned to piracy or crime. Those who turned to piracy or crime went all over the place in the galaxy; the Rogue Imperial Warband operated as far away from the Galactic Empire as Vjun. It turned out that the pirates were operating from a Law-class light patrol craft, and, at the orbital defense station where Yula et al were stationed, everybody began to prepare to respond to the distress signal. It was going to be the first combat mission of the Chiloon fighter-bomber, loaded with proton rockets: it would be a little overkill to fight enemies with bombs loaded in the bomb bay - Yula knew that low-survivability missions were often larger in scale than high-survivability and she deemed the combat mission high-survivability. As she donned her flight suit to board the fighter issued to her, and engage pre-flight checks...

"Load proton rockets! We are preparing to take off"

"Proton rockets loaded, general" the technician told Yula, taking in a squadron of Chiloons to confront this new threat.

[member="Tempest Yore"]

 

[Tempest Yore]

Tempest, a Knight now. They don't hand fighters over to the Padawans. Green to an actual space flight, but she passed all her simulations testings. And it stuck in the back of her throat now, just how difficult the training was to undergo. In flight simulation classes, there is no human souls to connect with; the Force just cannot anticipate the randomness of the computerized fight. At least, she cannot perceive it. Yet. But she believes that having acceptable scores, she might do even better now that the Force can guide her.

The flight suit, not flattering. It took a growth spurt for her to accept the mundane military requirements. Men, women, all look the same on the outside, and hold the same expectations inside. When she comes home, however, the drab colors come off, and she can feel like a lady again. Her pant legs puffed out over her small build, giving her the appearance of a dried up prune. The gloves are just right though. The adequate grip over the palm, quite a surprise. The Quartermaster handed her a polished helmet after she hoisted herself into the flight chair, sinking into its tempurpedic mold. This also surprised her, as some of the simulator cockpit chairs proved they could hold three of her as she was jostled around in them!

"Good luck young lady," the quickly Quartermaster bid to which she nodded respectively, before he hit the exterior switch to lock the hatch and scramble on to the next craft.

She was signaled to engage her engines and within seconds later to hit the thrusters. Soon the G-Force of the landing bay was gone to the weightlessness of space. She fell in formation. It did hot feel as if even a minute had passed before the group received the preflight coordinates and engaged the hyperdrive.

The blackness around her disappeared to streaks of light, then suddenly the scene unfolding at their destination planet. It looked like bedlam broke out to the untrained eye, but Tempest knows every fighter of the Dominion has a position to uphold. She stayed glued to her lead gunner, to protect them, as the Pirate's vessel turned towards the Dominion fleet and began to engage.

"We've been boarded! We've been boarded!" she heard over the many overlapped messages coming from coms with the Orbital Defense Station.

 

[Klesta]

"We've been boarded! We've been boarded!" she heard over the many overlapped messages coming from coms with the Orbital Defense Station.

The Magic School Bus, a modified GR-75 painted yellow with black stripes and comprising numerous viewports, has been boarded, that much is true. There were several pirates taking the modified GR-75 hostage as she saw [member="Tempest Yore"] approach the enemy pirate ship, with Yula and her heavy proton rockets being primed and readied. But there couldn't be a whole lot of pirates, if 5 gunners were necessary, 1 for engineering and 1 for piloting; half the pirate crew was there just to keep the ship flying in operational condition, if the lifeform sensor reading was anything to go from. She had to make use of evasive maneuvers as the pirates opened fire on her while using the laser cannon turrets, flying as evasively as she could. But even then the enemy laser cannons didn't land a single hit on her despite the numerous near-misses, with the two turrets trained at Yula, perhaps because pirates feel that Yula was more of a threat than anyone else in-system, including, but not limited to, Tempest. The frustrated pirates then fired a proton torpedo at her in an attempt to deal with her...

"Incoming missile alert!" the missile warning system blared at Yula.

The missile warning system urged her to do some loopings, hopefully making it harder for the pirates to accurately track her down, and also harder for the missile to accurately track her in flight. Meanwhile, Tempest arrived from another angle, leaving the pirates perplexed but Yula was relieved.

 

[Tempest Yore]

Tempest felt like a leaf blowing in the wind, as she tumbled through space to avoid her craft being hit. An odd sensation suddenly struck her, and she reached out through the Force to affirm it. She felt like she was reaching into Chaos, and she fought through it to touch upon the life onboard the transport ship. The fear onboard was incredibly intense, but only emanated from a few individuals, likely the crew. The overall sensation she perceived is hopelessness, which was magnified by the vast majority.

"Is it? Its a slave transport?" She would be damned if she did not find out where they came from.

At this time, she felt anything could be happening. 'Perhaps the pirates came to steal them for their own profit? Perhaps they came to free them?' She would never know, unless she can manage to get onboard the transport.

The Jedi opened her text comm panel and sent a secure code to the Station requesting visual schematics on the layout of a stock vessel. She drew her fighter close to the cargo transport. She wanted a visual on any available dock.

Her small slim fighter seemed to slip out of sight of the invading pirate ship which was busy with its immediate agenda of warding off the Dominion onslaught. She noticed a cargo pod that had its doors blasted off it, and its cargo jettisoned out into oblivion. If she could get the interior doors open, she could enter onto the transport from into the decompression chamber on the interior side.

They had been boarded. The shields are already down, the Knight went for it.

 

[Klesta]

Meanwhile, Yula made pretty complex maneuvers in an attempt to evade the proton torpedo fired at her, while being remembered that even the much-vaunted tracking of the Brilliant missiles used by the Primeval would bleed energy if the target maneuvers, forcing the missile to slow down; once the torpedo went dead-stick, that is, ran out of fuel, then she could go hit some enemy turret, creating another entry point for [member="Tempest Yore"] if the decompression chamber closed too quickly. But as she fired more rounds, the pirate ship's particle shields were draining, to the point where she even blew an enemy turret under a sustained barrage of fire. Whoever that is, use that thing as an impromptu docking port, she thought. By now the air was leaking from the blown turret and the pirates had to vent and evacuate the casemate underneath the turret before too much air is bled off into the vast blackness of space.