May The Force Be With Q episode 3b

"Three, break right on my mark." Said The Baron.  "Mark!"  The K-148 turned
and was out of the pursuing X-Wings line of fire so quickly that the pilot
had barely enough time to cry 'Where the fuck did......?'  Before the Baron
blew him to atoms with his blaster cannons.

"I love this ship."  Cried the Baron.

"Ok, 182nd let the Tie's grab the rest of the fighters, Lets see what these
puppies do against a cap ship.  Form up and Target the Mon Cal cruiser.
Single fire, advanced missiles."

A chorus of replies came back over the comm.

"This is ten, copy leader."  Said  Lt Taylor, he had only been with the
squadron a short time and in his first outing had ejected from his craft,
and been badly injured. It was during his time in sickbay that they had
discovered he was allergic to bacta.  When he had awoke after several weeks,
he found that he was no longer whole.  they had replaced his lower left arm
and hand, his left eye and his tongue.  He had been angry at this, he was an
attractive man, now he was a machine.  He had spent many weeks in sickbay,
most of this learning to move around properly. He had to learn to speak
again with his prosthetic tongue, which was made of a new flexi-durasteel.
Taylor had adapted well to all of the changes, his eyesight was better, his
strength in his left hand was incredible (he had paid the medics to increase
it)  and his tongue would never rust, in fact he joked that if he got vaped
in a fight, the only thing left to identify him would be that tongue.

The K-148's streaked towards the Mon Cal cruiser,  each forming up on there
flight leader in a diamond formation.

"Getting a lock, sending sensor feed now."  The Baron looked at his tactical
display.  "Heebee, send the info to the rest of the squad."

"Yes commander."  came the metallic reply.  These ships were equiped with on
board astromechs, like the R2s the rebels were so fond of, but these were
incorparated into the design of the ship, you could remove the memory core
of each one but no more.  The advantage of this was a counterpart level with
the fighter,  rated at about 47% above astromech / fighter efficency. The
Baron had nicknamed him  'Heebee'  because the tech crews weren't used to
them and it gave them the 'Hebe jebie's'

"Ok, 182nd's  fire on my command."  He waited as the cap ship crew larger in
his cockpit,   green bolts streaking out towards them as the gunners tried
to intimidate them into breaking off.

"Wait......stay on target,   Fire.  One, away!"

"This is two,  away!"

"Three, away!

Missiles streaked towards the cruiser as each pilot pulled the trigger, the
gunnery crews desparately tracking them, but without success, the missiles
impacted on the shield and exploded, after 6 hits the shields around the
rear quarter collapsed the remainder hit the hull and  blew it away.

As the squadron broke off they saw the damage they had caused,  the whole
back quarter was gone, vaped. A huge gaping hole was all that was left.  As
the ship started to list, the engines which were still at full thrust, broke
the backbone.  And due to the sudden decrease in mass to propel, flew
forward slamming into the ship with a deadly impact.  The cruiser broke
apart, it's lights flickering twice before falling dark.  The remains of the
cruiser tumbled away, getting caught in the gravity well of the nearby
planet, and being pulled down to it's final death.

The Baron grinned to himself, 12 missiles to take out a cap ship,  these
ships would make bantha fodder out of the so called New Republic.  If only
Admiral Whiteheart could get his hands on some more, they were after all new
and not yet in full scale production.  He would submit a report recommending
they purchase as many as possible.

Baron checked his tactical heads up display. The remaining X-wings had taken
out most of the Ties, and the B-wings were giving the ISD Vengeance a rough
time.

"7, 10, take your squads and take out those B-wings.  the rest of you take
those X-wings out."

The squadron split in to two groups each forming up with their wingman.

"Ok, switch to blaster cannons, full throttle. 11 with me" Lt Gavin Taylor
had been looking forward to this, time for some payback!

He targetted the nearest B-wing as it lined up for another run at the
Vengeance.

"Eat this you flying fuck!!  he snarled, red death leapt from his wingtip
cannons.  The B-wing tried to turn, but too late.  The first volley ate up
his shields, the second chewed into his ventral wing.  The third volley
peirced the cockpit, venting it to space.  Taylor screamed "Take that you
fucking whore!"

He wheeled to port leaving the stricken craft heading for deep space, if the
pilot wasn't dead he soon would be.

Taylor targeted the next B-wing and dealt it a similar blow, he was really
getting into this. He dodged and weaved after the B-wings, getting two more.
Finally he came upon one who was a little harder to hit.

"Damn this one is good."  He dived after the ship down towards the
Vengeance, turbolasers lanced out at the B-wing, one missed and struck
Taylor's fighter.

"Vengeance, hold your fire. are you trying to kill me?"  He quickly checked
his shields, at least it was only a grazing shot. He concentrated on the
B-wing which had gained some ground. Flying low over the structure he chased
the enemy, dodging up and around TL batteries and sensor domes, barely 2
meters from the hull. The B-wing headed for the gap under the left of the
main tower, Taylor swung right. The B-wing pilot swung around to the right
obviuosly thinking he could sneak back the way he came. As the pilot looked
up he saw Taylor's fighter come hurtling at him cannons blasting, his
cockpit exploded around him, he didn't even have time to scream as his
breath was ripped from his body.

"Scratch one more gimp." He sneered.

"We've lost 6," came the report from 3 over his comm "5 is hit."

He switched frequencies, "1 this is 2 do you require assistance?"

"Affirmative 10," came Barons reply "come and join us. We appear to have
encountered Rogue squadron."

Taylor grimaced, Rogue squadron the New Republics elite squadron, this was
going to be interesting.

"Vengeance this is Lt Taylor, suggest you launch some more support to tackle
the B-wings."

"Ok, ladies," he said to his flight group "it would seem that rogue squadron
has decided to make an appearence, let's toast 'em."

He kicked his throttle to full power and shunted laser power in as well. The
K-148 accelerated away, the inertial compensators were already turned down
to almost minimum. Taylor was pushed back into his seat under the force
exherted on him.

The Baron was weaving and dodging, the X-wing on his tail would not budge,
it's pilot was pulling some of the most amazing moves he'd ever seen.  His
wingman had his hands full with yet another X-wing.

"Shit!" he shouted as the x-wing scored a few hits on his shields, "Heebee,
shield strength?"

"148%" came the reply

"Commander this is 10, turn hard to mark 278 on three."

"Acknowledged 10."

"one....two....three."

Baron pulled hard on his flight yoke,  kicked in his vector thrust, and
stamped hard on his rudder pedal, he spiralled and dove away from the
x-wing.  The pilot tried to match his turn but over shot, running straight
into Taylor's missile fired blind and at point blank range. The X-wing
exploded and Taylor flew straight through the debris, his shields sparking
from the clatter of micro fragments hitting them.

All Baron heard was Taylor's laughter over the comm, perhaps he was enjoying
this a little too much.

"Nice shooting 10,  BTW I think you just killed Tycho Celchu.  He's leading
up the rogues at the moment, and I think only Wedge Antilles himself could
have  pulled of those moves any better."

The battle didn't last much longer, the loss of Tycho hit the rest of the
rogues hard, they knew they would lose. as soon as they could they ran,
engaged their hyperdrives and vanished.

"Ok, Let's go home, people.  The Nerf steaks are on Taylor."



"Well Baron, your report makes for interesting reading." Captain Balham put
down the data pad.  "You say they knew exactly where you were going to make
the transfer?"

"Yes sir.  They were waiting for us as we dropped out of hyperspace.  If it
hadn't been for the fact that we were prepped for departure, our losses
could have been worse."

"Hmmm, it would appear your transfer to us has become more knowledgeable
than I would like.  I will look into this Baron, and rest assured when I
find the leak, I will plug it personally."  He gave Baron a long icy stare.
"My condolances on the loss of Lt Huthret. Would you like to take care of
notifying his family?"

"Yes sir,  also sir I would like to recommend Lt Gavin Taylor for a
commendation, his flying today was exemplary, he has battled hard with his
injuries.  Today was his first mission back with us, " He smiled  "he had
asked me to wipe his kill slate clean sir, he  said that he was a new person
and should start again.  today he became a cybernetic ace. He was also the
one responsible for the death of Celchu."

"Are you sure it was him?"

"Yes sir, intelligence finished breaking the comm codes and positively
identified his voice."

"A good days work Baron 38 kils and 1 loss.  Please inform 'Captain' Taylor,
that I like his fighting spirit."

"Thank you sir. now if you'll excuse me sir. I have a letter to write."

"Of course, dismissed"



Commander Antah walked into the simulator room, and spoke briefly with the
techs. He then walked over to the simulators where Lt Kynes was climbing
out.

"Lt. At ease. Congratulations, you have one of the highest scores ever
recorded for this mission."

"Thank you sir."

"I have some more good news, An opening has appeared in Tie / Epsilon Beta
Squadron. Report to hanger five, deck officer Raul......... Well move it
Lt."

"Yes sir!" Kynes spun around and jogged out of the room.

"Did he really score that highly sir?" asked an aide

"No, but we need some pilots, the Bomber pilot just got bumped to the 182nd.
I hope Admiral Whiteheart hurries up with those recruits he promised. I'm
working with grunts here."

More to come in episode  3c