Star Wars - Shadow Invasion
Episode 5: Assault
The Time had come: General Shore had assembled a small fleet of Republic warships to attack the imperial blockade over planet Uprilia. The provisional government of the New Republic had approved of this operation after the leaders of Uprilian resistance, Ana and Maeve had spoken before the senate about the situation on the planet and the imperial involvement had been confirmed by the SIS.
General Shore coordinated the assault from his cruiser “Endurance” which was commanded by Mon Calamari Commodore Barca. The fleet consisted of the dreadnaughts “Vindicator” and “Steelhead”, Nebulon-B frigates “Recreation”, “Deliverance” and “Aurora”, as well as corvettes “Vigilant”, “Screaming Mynoc” and “Star Duster”. A fleet of five Gallofree-Yards transports and a colorful group of nine Action IV, V and VI class freighters were supposed to land on the planet as soon as the capital ships had penetrated the blockade. There they were supposed to take as many refugees on board who would be rallied by an agent beforehand. Battling the TIE-fighters was the assignment of the famous “Wild Squadron” led by Captain Arrowwind and “Red Squadron” commanded by Lieutenant Jen Tanut. “Blue Squadron”, led by Captain Su in her modified YT-1300 freighter “Red Crane” was to accompany the transports down to the surface and fend off any attacks by ground based artillery, troops and picked-up TIEs.
“Blue Squadron” consisted of 12 pilots, including Lt. Luka in his A-wing, Lt. Jonas Youngriver in his X-wing, Flight Officer Kane in his X-wing and Flight Officer Lehina in her A-wing. As crew for the “Red Crane” Wroonian Su, one of the famous “Protectors of the Galaxy”, had taken human mercenary Frank, bounty hunter Moonshine and Jedi apprentice Chagaul on board to help with the gun turrets and optimize cockpit performance.
The first surprise to the assault group was that instead of the reported two Victory-class star destroyers there were four of these warships waiting in orbit around Uprilia. The element of surprise, however, seemed to be rather on the attacker’s side as the defenders clearly had not estimated that the republic would send a fleet of this size. The “Stalker”, “Ravager” and “Harpy” were destroyed in a swift battle, so that only the “Triumphant” could escape. The Republic fleet changed into a defensive formation around the planet since the imperial counterattack was due any minute.
Meanwhile the starfighters valiantly fought against a slightly overwhelming number of TIEs, but were able to neutralize most of them. Nevertheless, three of the freighters were destroyed when they passed the center of the battle. “Blue Squadron” escorted the rest down to the planet’s surface, but the defenders also had put up heavy artillery that managed to scrape another three freighters from the skies before the fighters could eliminate the canons and remaining TIE-fighters.
Lt. Luka’s A-wing was damaged during the assault and his weapon systems were offline so he had to land between the skyscrapers to perform the most urgent repairs on his fighter. FO Lehina, however, was lured into a dogfight with a TIE and flew right into a trap between the skyscrapers: a slim cable between two buildings sliced her fighter in half so it crashed, but the pilot was able to eject in time to stay unharmed. Unfortunately her parachute was caught on a high ledge and she nearly fell to her death.
In the meantime Su and the other transports had landed and started to take refugees on board. Soldiers were securing the streets against attacking shadow beasts, several of which showed up and tried to devour as many refugees as possible. Frank and Chagaul helped with the evacuation and fought against the attacking shadow beasts with their blaster and lightsaber respectively. Bounty hunter Moonshine noticed the crash and dire situation of Lehina and went up the turbolift in one of the adjacent skytowers. She then waited at a window for the right moment to ignite her jetpack and grab Lehina. It worked, Moonshine caught the falling pilot’s parachute and both were flung through the windows of an opposite building. There they were able to get up and take the turbolift down to ground level.
During the course of these events the “Triumphant” had returned with the first wave of reinforcements. Victory-class star destroyers “Silencer”, “Spitfire” and “Spectre” as well as Imperial-class “Vanquisher” and “Wrathbringer” attempted to break through the now defending Republic fleet to prevent the evacuation of the planet. Some ships were slightly damaged, others more heavily, but the defenses held and the attackers lost the “Vanquisher”, “Triumphant” and “Silencer”.
On the ground the last refugees were taken aboard and the fighters had to fend off one last wave of attackers until the transports could finally take off. Lt. Luka’s A-wing was good to go again, so he got back to the rest of the squadron. Due to the hectic the ground forces had been split up between the ships. Frank, Chagaul, Moonshine and Lehina had taken the next best transport instead of going back to the “Red Crane” as they very much disliked Captain Su’s showing off with stunt maneuvers anyway.
When the transports reached orbit more imperial ships were coming out of hyperspace to form a blockade. The Imperial star destroyer “Exterminator”, as well as the Victory-class “Torment” and “Poisonous” filled the gaps of the previously destroyed warships. Then space itself ruptured and folded and the flagship of Admiral Ralin’s fleet appeared: Vitiation-Supercruiser “Reaper of Life”. The desperate Republic forces knew that they had to clear a corridor through the enemy lines soon in order to get the freighters with all the civilians on board to safety. Starfighters and capital ships took hits from enemy fire to shield the transports, but some shots came through and they also suffered casualties. Commodore Barca had the “Endurance” maneuver between the “Reaper of Life” and the rest of his fleet, but even the mighty Mon Calamari cruiser could not withstand the firepower of the imperial flagship. Turbolaser-batteries tore holes into her hull and General Shore had no choice but to abandon ship and send the crew to the escape pods. He himself was able to make a narrow escape before the ship exploded in a giant fireball.
The dreadnaughts then concentrated their fire on the starboard flank where they had spotted a weak point in the imperial formation, but the “Wrathbringer” would not give way, no matter what the Republic forces threw at her. Eventually, Captain Neesha Kii self-handedly flew her heavily damaged corvette “Vigilant” directly into the “Wrathbringer”’s bridge section, thereby destroying both ships and opening up a flight corridor for the refugee transports. In small groups the freighters jumped through the opening into the safety of hyperspace while the capital ships took in as many escape pods as they could.
When Victory star destroyer “Spitfire” wanted to devastate the last group of transports Captain Su set her “Red Crane” on an intercept-course. She fired a volley of proton torpedoes on the destroyer and went out in a fiery blaze as the frigate “Deliverance” fired her turbolasers at the exact same moment through the collapsing shields and destroyed the “Spitfire”.
After all remaining ships had made their escape and were safe General Shore, whose escape pod had been picked up by one of the frigates, made an assessment of the situation: Mon Calamari cruiser “Endurance” and corvette “Vigilant” had been destroyed, the rest of the ships were damaged, some pretty badly. The frigates “Recreation” and “Deliverance” had each suffered a hit to the bridge. This had killed the captain and the whole bridge crew of the “Deliverance”, so the ship had been commandeered by first officer Damien Blaze-qui from the emergency bridge. On the “Recreation” Twi’lek Captain Nira Taavi had been badly injured while she had prevented her helmsman to be sucked out into space. She had suffered several wounds all over her body and lost her left eye to a piece of shrapnel, but she had held on until the emergency force fields had kicked in and shielded the open gap from the vacuum of space. For this act of bravery she received a commendation from General Shore who subsequently made the “Recreation” his new command ship.
In a memorial ceremony Captain Neesha Kii and the brave crew of the “Vigilant” were honored as well as all other heroes who had sacrificed their lives to save thousands of innocent Uprilian citizens from a horrible fate. Captain Su was also posthumously awarded a medal of bravery, and General Shore seemed deeply moved as he held the memorial speech to bid farewell to the second Protector of the Galaxy who had given their life. All the surviving fighters, supporters and pilots were also awarded a medal.
Unbeknownst to the Republic fleet another drama took place in orbit above Uprilia. Admiral Ralin stood on the bridge of the “Reaper of Life” and surveyed the battlefield. Even though they had driven away the rebel scum half of his fleet had been destroyed in the process. The clean-up would take days and bind numerous resources of which, it just occurred to him, he did no longer have plenty.
A shuttle from Uprilia made its way to the hangars on the cruiser’s underbelly. The com-officer reported that an important visitor from the planet had arrived: prime minister Mastarshan himself had come to thank his savior. But when the admiral wanted to shake the chief-of-state’s hand dark, smoky streaks flowed from the latter’s eyes and entered the admiral’s body through his own eyes. Subsequently, the admiral fell in with the dark laughter of the prime minister who declared their plan a total success: The “Reaper of Life” now belonged to the Shadow Combine!
Episode 6: Annihilation
The Mon Calamari cruiser “Endurance” suffered a massive hit during the battle of Uprilia and everyone on board was shaken, some were knocked off their feet or smashed into a bulkhead, and many were injured. Then, suddenly, the tone of the alarm klaxons changed and on intercom General Shore ordered all hands to abandon ship. Ewok-scout Cookie, near-human explorer Larson and smuggler Baran who had been on board the “Endurance” to act as backup, ran down to the hangar where their Ghtroc-freighter “Treekthin” had been parked. They didn’t want to leave without their ship and so they came across several crew members who ran in the opposite direction to get to their escape pods as ordered.
On their way to the main hangar they ran into pilot Abel, mercenary Marius and force-sensitive doctor Isa Zehn who was in the middle of helping some wounded from the medbay get to the escape pods. Together they took the patients down to the hangar where they met Jawa bounty hunter Sansae and street thief Metalmike. The latter had been sentenced to spend some time in the ship’s brig, but the massive impact had disabled doors and force fields and now he was making his way out.
When the group arrived at the hangar they saw the “Treekthin” was the only ship left, among a few smoking wrecks, but more hits of turbolaser fire rocked the cruiser and led to parts of the hangar crashing down onto the deck. They came just in time to see a falling steel girder slicing the “Treekthin” in half, leaving them stranded. Shocked and desperate they ran to the aft section of the cruiser where three escape pods ware still available. They put all the wounded into the first pod and launched it manually, but those who were staring out a viewport could see that a floating piece of debris hit the capsule immediately after launch and destroyed it for good.
Without much of a choice Larson, Cookie, Baran and Marius took one of the remaining two escape pods while the rest climbed into the other. Fortunately, both pods had more luck than the wounded and didn’t collide with any debris or were hit by stray laser fire, but just as they took a deep breath and cheered that they were still alive, the Mon Cal cruiser exploded with a spectacular fireball that hit both pods, altered their trajectory and singed their com arrays. Both capsules were driven off the battlefield and into the atmosphere of Uprilia where they entered an uncontrolled free fall. One of the pods was able to open a parachute and slow their descent, but the chute of the second pod was stuck and they would have been smashed by the gravitational forces if the emergency repulsor field had not activated and softened their impact.
It seemed like a miracle that both capsules went down in close proximity and none of the eight passengers received more than a few bruises. The greater challenge now was to survive in the toxic wastelands of Uprilia. To max out their chances of survival they took all the emergency packs from the escape pods which contained environmental scanners, a water purifier, signaling devices and blaster pistols. Then they left the crash site so potential imperial search teams wouldn’t find them.
Upri-City was only a few hundred kilometers away, but since the assault it was devoid of humanoid life and instead overrun with shadow beasts, so that was not an option. After a few hours of marching through the wastes they had to decide if they wanted to check a hollow that could potentially contain a river or a mountain range. The group decided to head for the mountain range, but it wasn’t as far away as they had anticipated, nor was it a mountain range. It turned out to be a huge junkyard with scraps and wreckages of everything that had once been produced on Uprilia.
They found a moderately safe place with a roof and a few walls to rest a few hours while the scouts, the Jawa and the mercenary went out to get a better look at what they were dealing with and what they could find here. Especially the Jawa felt like in heaven with all the potential gadgets and toys lying around and went farther into the seemingly endless heap of junk. The others made the acquaintance of a group of mutated womprats, but could strike them down with blasters and lightsaber.
Meanwhile, the scouting party had found a promising room under a huge heap of metal that could be shut off with a sturdy airlock against other hostile creatures. When the rest of the group came along they discovered that the safe room in fact wasn’t a building, but an archaic spacecraft. Thick layers of steel were linked with massive rivets to keep the hull together. An old-fashioned fusion reactor in the engineering section could be fired up to provide light and life support.
The other room was a cockpit, but all the pilots were only used to flying modern day spaceships and were out of their comfort zone with the bulky controls and gauges. Now it was time for Larson to shine, as he had grown up with technology on this level. He conducted a systems check and noticed that the spacecraft was in perfect shape and had enough fuel and energy to take off and fly into space. After a short discussion everyone agreed that everything was better than waiting here like a sitting duck, now that a TIE-patrol had picked up their energy signature and taken the junkyard under fire.
With help from the Jawa and the pilot Larson managed to launch the bulky spacecraft and hit full throttle on their rocket drive. When the TIEs were closing in the crew searched for weapons systems and found a charging switch in the cockpit, as well as a pop-out crosshair and a large trigger. Since the mercenary was proficient with manual weapons systems he toggled the switch, charged up the weapons and pulled the trigger when the first TIE flew into his crosshairs. Red-hot glowing metal shrapnel was accelerated by magnetic coils and shot out of the gun barrel right through the TIE’s cockpit. The weapon was a railgun and it was used two more times to get rid of the other TIEs. Then they had made it into orbit.
There they used their signal booster to send out a distress signal. Unfortunately, the imperials seemed to have picked it up as well, as one of the star destroyers panned around and accelerated in their direction while it dispatched a squadron of TIEs which would catch up to the antiquarian vessel in no time. Only now the crew realized that this flying museum had no hyperdrive and they were trapped.
Suddenly a flash of light erupted as a ship came out of hyperspace. Cheering enthusiastically on the com-channel Su announced the arrival of her “Red Crane” which had escaped her alleged destruction during the battle by a daring hyperspace jump. In the meantime she had needed some repairs and now she was back just in time to let the TIEs veer off in panic. Su flew her ship to the archaic spacecraft and used the magnetic clamps on the “Red Crane”’s underbelly to secure the vessel. Then they made the jump into hyperspace.
When they arrived at the rendez-vous point of the Republic fleet the archaic spacecraft was released so both ships could land in the hangar of the frigate “Recreation” which had become the new command ship of General Shore. The General himself hurried to the hangar deck and was barely able to restrain himself from hugging Su, as the Protector of the Galaxy had been a staple in his plan to motivate the troops and her alleged death had shaken them all deeply. Now that she was back a short celebration was held to honor the lives that they were able to save.
This time Su was only marginally interested in celebrating. Instead she was eager to find the “Reaper of Life” and pay her back, so she worked hard on a fruitful strategy. In the end Su had to face the truth that she would have to upgrade her ship in order to pull off her plan, but she was low on funds.
Desperately she called her PR-manager and marketing experts and together they came up with an idea to use Su’s reputation as a Protector of the Galaxy to make her one of the top selling advertisement icons. Striking a big deal with Space Cola (“So the force will be with you, too!”) and other popular brands was only the beginning to her revenue strategy. Su also negotiated shady deals with Mia De’Ore and other Protectors as well as Ranja Killian, cousin to the deceased heroine Trance Killian, to make their likenesses appear in comic books, as dolls and action figures to gain more cash.