Blind Sided

Before the pilots had time to give us a quick overview of what exactly was going on, Hugo had practically ripped his harness from his seat and barreled down the walkway towards the warhead launcher. The rest of us followed him down the walkway shortly, each of us going to separate corners of the ship to different turbo lasers.

“Requesting status report of enemy target from starboard laser. Over.” I asked as I strapped myself into my new seat and prepared my weapon for attack.

“We’ve received information of confirmed pirate sighting from an unknown source. Radar has picked up incoming vessel which is not responding to any of our requesting calls,” the copilot answered, “warning signals are being sent out. Prepare to fire on our command. Over.”

I flipped the view in my helmet to sync with the sight on the laser in order for more accurate shooting. I didn’t usually rely on the site in my helmet for my aiming, however, pirates were unpredictable in their flight patterns unlike the Alliance troops. A little assistance never hurt anyway.

“I see it,” Came Charlie’s voice from my comlink, now an open communication line between the six of us on the ship, “looks like it’s a modified CloakShape fighter. Aren’t those built for more atmospheric flying? What’s it doing out here? Over.”

It was a question we were all wondering as the seemingly loner ship started to get closer and closer to us. After a few minutes the ship had now appeared in my line of sites and was just floating past us, as if the beings operating it didn’t even care we were there. Actually the entire ship seemed to be vacant.

“Are the scanners picking up any heat sources? Over.” I asked the pilots.

“…No. We aren’t picking up any heat sources. Scanners are not picking up any being in the fighter, however, the ship’s systems are set on idle. This might just be abandoned. We are going to continue en route to our destination. Stay in your positions until further notified. Over.”

Letting out a sigh to try and ease the feeling of anticipation away, I sat back in my seat but kept a firm grip on the joysticks controlling my weapon. It seemed like a false alarm, but in my gut something about this situation didn’t seem right. Curiosity snuck its way into my mind and I started wondering if exploring the fighter would be a possibility. At least then we would know for sure if anyone was still on the ship.

As we passed the fighter we rounded above it, giving it a fair amount of space just in case it was just sitting dormant, waiting for us to let our guard down. Slowly turning, the top side of the ship started to rotate towards me and I felt my heart skip a beat.

“Wait a minute. Hold the IPV steady.” I ordered, ignoring the proper requesting protocols.

The uneasiness I felt started to get stronger and stronger as I quickly switched the vision in my helmet to the macro-binocular view plate to confirm my suspicion. I stared at the symbol on the ship for a brief moment, ignoring the protest from our pilot about my apparent lack of proper communication and bossy behavior. In my mind his opinion didn’t matter at this point when the symbol of the Black Sun Syndicate appeared clear as day in my view port.

“It’s a Black Sun ship!” I found my voice booming into the comlink over the complaining of our pilot.

Suddenly everyone was quiet and I felt our ships acceleration start to kick in. We were all well qualified to take out Black Sun gang members, but the fact that we were traveling alone and not in an escorted group or a larger, more armored cargo ship made me nervous. The Black Sun never traveled alone and hardly ever did they leave a lone ship unmarked by their handiwork. Our protocol was to get myself and the other three Scout Troopers to Dathomir as quickly and stealthily as possible in order to meet up with the rest of our new squad members to start our assignment. This little hiccup just turned our simple trip into a more serious endeavor.

The Black Sun was a large and powerful crime syndicate that was known for dispatching small armies onto planets at random to ensure terror and fear into those that did not fulfill their leaders’ requests. They were ruthless and destructive, knowing no boundaries when it came to breaking the law and committing any and every type of illegal activity known to the galaxy. What was even more alarming being not only their advanced organization and skills with technology, but that their influence and corruption was spread throughout the galaxy in various locations.

“Keep your eyes peeled. Over.”

I could practically feel the high strung nerves of my cohorts throughout the ship as the time slowly passed when we continued on our course. Eventually the atmosphere became more relaxed and we were given the confirmation of returning to our original seats by our pilots. Even though everyone else had collected themselves and started talking with each other once again, I still felt something prodding at my nerves as if hinting that I should still keep some form of lookout. Trusting my instincts, I stayed at my turret while the others returned to the main quarters to relax. Soon the repetitive pattern of randomly placed stars against the dark background lead me to close my eyes and I finally drifted off to sleep.

~~~

I awoke from a violent jolt and the sudden screaming of voices in my ear.

“Hanibal. Hanibal come in! Requesting help on the turbo laser. Over.” Strained Kile’s slightly panicked voice.

“Hanibal here. Request on status report. Over.”

“Black Sun raiders. They must have had a tagging system on the ship we passed earlier. They grabbed our flight pattern coordinates and followed us. I guess they decided we were worth the trouble. Over.”

“Well it sucks to be them,” Hugo’s gravelly voice growled, almost making the speakers in my helmet vibrate against my ear, “kirffing pirates, we should have blown that fighter back there to bits when we had the chance.”

Hugo’s voice was drowned out by the sound of someone’s turbo laser firing as a Vaksai Starfighter flew by in a blur. Another sudden jolt rocked the ship to the side as the pilot’s performed a barrel roll to lessen the blow and clear away from the fire now raining upon us. Gaining my bearings, I looked out my viewport and my hands automatically went on manual, firing at any fighter that flew past me. They were everywhere.

It was as if a flock of ten or twelve fighters had just appeared out of nowhere and dropped a massive cloud of chaos over our heads. I was unaware of how they actually appeared since I had apparently fallen in a deep enough sleep that the alarms and voices of my squad mates hadn’t been able awaken me right away.

Setting up the site in my helmet I started to target the pirate fighters off one by one. Eventually the chaos was starting to thin out, however, the race to defeat each other intensified. The fighters were flying in unpredictable patterns and firing even if they were nowhere close to hitting us. Our pilots were doing everything they could to attempt to dodge the almost constant rain of fire that was being thrown at us in all directions, but our shields power kept decreasing with every hit that shook the patrol craft.

“The shields can’t take any more direct hits. We are going to make an attempt to land on the planet-“

“We are doing the best we can at the moment! Try flying a little straighter!” Charlie retorted, apparently getting irritated by the fact we were being hounded by pirates.

“How about you try shooting a little straighter! You scouts are supposed to have the best aim in the Stormtrooper Corps.”

“If you keep bickering we won’t have to worry about who flies or shoots straighter.” Stressed Kile over the intense firing. At this point we had all abandoned the normal comlink protocol.

As if Kile’s prediction was a fortune telling, the alarms started screaming even louder in our ears and the HUD in my helmet started to flash, indicating that we had absolutely no protection left as the shields were now officially gone. Feeling some panic starting to prick at my nerves my body tensed up and my hands started to move faster than my brain could comprehend at an attempt to shoot anything that flew by. Then, as if falling from the stars, a possible solution to our problem appeared in my head.

“Hugo, how many missiles’ do you have left in the warhead??”

“There’s only a few left…”

“I have an idea; I’ll need at least two of them for a parting gift.”

“Perfect, that’s all I have left anyway.”

“Ok, Nalley and Purlon, we’ll chase a few of the fighters together with the beams then have Graven fire at them with the warhead when they’re clustered together.”

It was silent between the comlink’s for a few brief moments, the firing of turbo lasers from the other two was the only thing I could hear, before Kile finally answered. “Hitting two birds with one stone… Worth a shot, I don’t hear anyone else coming up with any ideas.”

I didn’t hear any agreeing or disagreeing from our pilots and I wasn’t about to wait for their approval of my idea either. Out of the corner of my viewport I saw a fighter barrel roll in my direction to try and avoid Kile’s shooting and another one flying in a similar direction away from Charlie’s firing. Letting loose my trigger fingers, the fighters turned to play chicken with each other but were thankfully unsuccessful. The explosion of the two fighters that close to my viewport was almost blinding, but was still a lovely sight to see.

“Well what do ya know, it actually worked.” I mumbled to myself, a grin spreading over my face from underneath my helmet.

There were only three fighters left that we had to deal with and then all we had to do was safely land on the nearest planet, which had appeared in part of my viewport during the fight. The task didn’t seem like it would be too difficult to do now that the initial surprise we all felt was past us now.

Just as I was about to fire, having lined a Black Sun fighter up perfectly with my site, the three remaining fighters suddenly regrouped and turned tail. Still sticking with the plan I hand conjured up, Hugo sent the last of the warhead’s missiles chasing the group of fighters and managed to clip the wing of one of the fighters, sending it spiraling into the second fighter flying beneath it. Through the bursting explosion I watched as the lone Black Sun ship initiated its hyperdrive and disappeared.