The Dor-Nameth shipyard

[12:48:25]Harla Dane: Outside the viewports, the stars were all alike. None of them brighter, none of them could be called a local sun. Where normally a person could expect to see a bit of their own ship’s fuselage when looking outside, in this case there was nothing. The very perceptive would have noticed only the shape made out of missing starlight - a ship-shaped patch of darkness, in a sea of stars. There was not enough light for human eyes here.

The largest of those patches of darkness was a big, rounded shape up ahead. A rogue planet, perpetually frozen, floating forever in interstellar space. A small field of asteroids orbited it, and a couple of them were just large enough that they could generously be called moons. The whole system was just enough mass to reliably yank a ship out of hyperspace, and that made the rogue planet a useful meeting place: anyone who knows of its existence and vector could plot a jump to its likely vicinity, and trust that they would be drawn out of hyperspace somewhere in its vicinity. To everyone else, the place and ships around it might as well not exist.[+]

[12:49:02]Harla Dane: It made sense that it had been chosen as the meeting place for the heist. The information sent to participants had been only that: a point in space and a time.

Navicomputers would tell they were a short way under the ecliptic of the galaxy, and no major hyperspace disturbance existed between them and the nearest inhabited systems. From here, it was a single jump to Dor Nameth, Bright Jewel, Anobis and several other important systems in the sector. Sensors would inform that there were a handful of craft present: The Heretic was the meeting place, and it kept to a high orbit, a big boxy shadow drifting far above the planet. A couple of republic shuttles had brought in muscle provided by captain Pallaeon, but they had already completed the transfer onto the Heretic and now sat in orbit, waiting for the next step in the operation. A couple small freighters were also in orbit, unremarkable except that their identifications were as old as the Clone Wars, as were the ships themselves. Presumably that was additional help.

[13:13:52]Jira Thrane: The Kava dropped out of hyperspace with it's crew on alert, mostly due to Jira's paranoia. It approached the rendezvous point all by the books, gracefully maneuvering into position after identifying itself as friendly. After it joined the small contingent Jira worked out permission to temporarily dock and board the Heretic. Whether it was all automated or if Harla was at the coms it would go smoothly, Jira coming aboard by herself with only herself and what she could carry. As soon as the airlock closed the Kava pulled away, though the piloting lacked the finesse that had previously demonstrated. The blonde herself looked much more composed than their last meeting, her hair pulled back and nearly taken care of instead of the wild mane from before. Then again it would have been hard to get a helmet she had under her arm over that mess. Decked out in a well fitting and armoredenvironmental suit, complete with jet pack she had the look of a mercenary for sure, no piece of armament seeming to match the make of another but all in a matching scheme that made it come across as customized rather than piecemealed together. Jira would follow instructions to the staging area on the ship.

[13:24:24]Harla Dane: Harla had been at the comms herself, and the procedures to join up with the rag-tag bunch of ships had been simple enough: once she was sure it really was Jira, she was just told which side of the Heretic to dock with, and that was that. In moments, the two airlocks met, and once pressure was normalized they could hiss open. The air from the other side was just a hint warmer and more humid than most captains kept their life support systems. It could be felt in the sudden rush of war air through the linked airlocks, but it wasn’t quite uncomfortable.

A single corridor led straight forward, after a few meters inside the Heretic there was an intersection to the left, but the doorway there was closed. Straight ahead was a lit room, the sound of chatter could be heard from it. It didn’t take a force sensitive to know where to go.[+]

[13:24:44]Harla Dane: The room was a surprisingly cramped cargo hold for a ship the size of the Heretic. A few seats had been arranged, and more had been improvised with crates. Carla stood by the corridor that led off from that room to the direction of the cockpit, while the many seats were taken by an eclectic mix: some were obviously professional troopers, they all wore the same armor, they sat with their backs straight, and chatter was subdued. They didn’t wear identifying tags, but it wouldn’t take a genius to realize they were Republic - exactly one platoon of them, too. The rest, slightly outnumbered, were a rough mix of the scum of the galaxy - mismatching armor, unusual gear, bad posture and a lot of swagger. “Welcome to the party,” Harla called out as Jira approached the room. “We are closing in on our window of opportunity, so whoever hasn’t made it yet is out. Pick a seat, and we can start this."

[13:31:20] Jira Thrane nodded to Harla in greeting before scanning the room. Out of the scum there was no one she recognized, which was always a plus, and she didn't seem to give the troopers much mind at all. Just the barest form of acknowledgement; she knew she wouldn't recognize any of them, and while the platoon leader might have been told about the presence of an operative as part of the mission by Titus, she knew better than to give any telling signs. She ended up in a seat in the middle, or rather a crate. Leaning forward with her helmet on a knee and her elbow on top of it she would have the look of someone playing attention, albeit maybe bored. A sort of cross between the motley crew to her left and the organized platoon to her right.

[13:37:59]Harla Dane: “Some of you I know have been briefed and can just trust your instructions,” the gaze roamed over the republic troopers. It wasn’t hard to tell that the two groups weren’t really mixing. The troopers mostly sat on one side, the scum mostly on the other. “The rest - you will want to know the plan is worth your neck before you stick it out. So I’ll go through everything.” She had looked to the other group as she spoke that second half, and strode close to the center of the room.

“Dor Nameth,” she began, and with a gesture a holodisplay came alive in the hold. It showed the local sector, several star systems marked out. Two of them were immediately familiar: Bright Jewel and Dor Nameth. “The local governor has recently completed construction of a new shipyard, after over three years of delays. I have passed through the system several times in the past month, and this is what is found there.”

Another gesture, and the holodisplay shifts to show, instead, the orbit of the planet Dor Nameth itself. It focuses towards a single point in high orbit, a space station. It was a tapering cylinder, visually resembling a scepter. Docked to its side was an imperial Star Destroyer, its front half surgically cracked open, obviously getting some sort of heavy-duty refurbishing or repairs. The familiar shape made it easy to judge scale: The Star Destroyer was quite large next to the station, about half the mass of it. Here and there, on smaller docks, were shuttles, blasboats and Ties, the Star Destroyer’s complement.[+]

[13:38:40]Harla Dane: “The shipyard is new, it’s tiny and it’s mostly automated. On-site defenses are poor: there is shuttle traffic between it and a few neighbouring space stations, in those space stations we can find how many dormitories are reserved for staff. No more than twenty, we can expect at most half of them to be security.”

Another gesture, and red lights come up in the holodisplay, focusing attention towards the cracked-open Star Destroyer, and lines are drawn between it and the bulky center of the shipyard. “Crucially for us, the extent of work on that Star Destroyer includes opening its weapon batteries. There must be a Star Destroyer’s worth of Tibanna stored in that shipyard, and because of the degree of automation involved, the only safe way to store that much Tibanna for the length of the refurbishment is to freeze it in Carbonite. That’s where the profit is.” At that point there were some grunts of acknowledgement from the rougher half of the crowd. Not so much for the republic troopers - unlike the rest, they weren’t here for credits.

“The governor has four orbital defense platforms and seems to believe that is all the defense his system needs. It is more than enough to stop any attempted invasion of his planet, yes, but-“ a gesture, and the holodisplay shows the planet as a big sphere, filling the center of the image. Five circles are traced around it, the orbits for the space stations. Bright dots move along those circles, the speed of motion clearly faster than a real orbit: the image is sped-up. “At regular intervals, roughly once per standard month, the orbits of the stations place the shipyard outside the range of the platforms for a full hour.” A quick, sharp gesture and the image stops. Broader spheres are drawn around each of the dots representing a defense platform, presumably their range. The dot representing the shipyard is well outside them.[+]

[13:38:56]Harla Dane: "What I could catch of chatter between the governor's orbital control and elements of Zsinj’s fleet seems to indicate he resents that Zsinj stations ships in his system at all. Accordingly, the presence is rather light,” she gestures again, and the holodisplay withdraws from the shipyard, instead showing a pair of frigates and a handful of fighters. It is a static image, the ties look like they’re frozen in time. Ship identifications are pulled up, giving the names for the two frigates.

“During a recent public disturbance in the Bright Jewel sector, Zsinj’s navy deployed forces to contain the chaos. The ships were these,” another gesture and the holodisplay shifts between images. Now it shows Ord Mantell’s orbit, focused around the Jubilee Wheel space station. Fighters are flying around it, and two frigates are close by, acting as pickets. Ship identifications come up: they’re the same frigates.

“A few tests conducted by one of our benefactors,” she looks towards the republic troopers at this point, the men nod. They know who it was. “Have confirmed: those frigates, though stationed at Dor Nameth, are the first responders for a large segment of the sector. Everyone follow so far?”

[13:49:05] Jira Thrane When the talk of plunder came up the blonde noticeably perked up, matching the response of the unsavory mix of vagabonds. Just blending in as well as she could as the briefing went on; and given the nature of her work it was spot on. By now she had the look of someone who had just had her interest sparked, pouring over the information, soaking it in like it was the first time, and that her life depended on it. Open ears and eyes, she leaned forward a bit more as she was engrossed. In the forefront of her mind there was the unshakable notion that Harla was as dangerous as she was intelligent. Just another reason to continue their newfound business relationship though.

[13:54:16]Harla Dane: “That is what we have to work with. Now, this is our plan.” She finally stops focusing on the scum half and addresses all equally. “ Our benefactor will provide a distraction. Just enough trouble to draw those frigates out, and keep them out. He will give us confirmation of their arrival off-system, at which point we will jump in - only the Heretic, no other ship. I will maneuver us towards a meeting with the shipyard, then turn off all systems, hide us from detection, and we drift in. Our approach is timed to coincide with the start of our one-hour window.”

A quick gesture, and the holodisplay shows a hypothetical arrival in-system. From the dot identified as the Heretic extends a curving line which goes towards a meeting with the slower-moving dot for the shipyard. “Once we are close enough to require that, I will active sensor and comm jammers. They will know something is wrong, they won’t know what or where. We will approach the shipyard, and break through one of its airlocks.”

“Our primary goal is to reach a central control unit for the station’s automation. When we reach it, we can employ the station’s own droids to carry their Tibanna to our cargo holds.” That brought some snickers from the scum side. Someone thought it was humorous to use a station’s own staff, as it were, to rob it.[+]

[13:55:54]Harla Dane: “We will also load up some of the shuttles stationed at the shipyard, for added cargo space. From the control unit, we will detach the docked spaceships, all but the Star Destroyer. At that point we will signal our benefactor. Starfighters will jump in to deal with any force that may have been deployed to stop us by that point, and shuttles will arrive in-system to man the ships we’ve detached. They will be floating cold and lifeless up to that point. The credits from the Tibanna is the payment for most of us,” she looks towards the scum half pointedly at that moment, “landing craft, shuttles, walkers, blast boats and more are the payment for our ally.”

“If all goes to plan,” that brought a few snickers, too. Apparently none of the scum expected things to go to plan. It was probably a wise attitude. “- we will be done loading up well within our time window. We get back to the Heretic, move out of the gravity well, and then make our escape. "

[14:04:46] Jira Thrane gave another silent nod. It all seemed well on paper. And the worst case scenario? She could ditch the ride back with the scum and take one of the shuttles for herself. Deep down she expected the Heretic to be rowdy on the jump out, she had worked with enough people like those in the hold to know that contract "renegotiations" were a possibility. She gave a sideway glance at the troopers for their reaction to all this. She was curious about how the forces would be spread out on the station, but figured that Harla hadn't got to that level of detail with her plan.

[14:11:25] Harla Dane looked over the two groups briefly, "any issues?" As expected, the troopers didn't voice any - they knew what they were in for, and danger was a part of the job they'd had the time to grow comfortable with. The other part of the group wasn't quite as stoic. There was muttering, exchanged glances. It wasn't a suicide mission, though, and the credits from that huge a haul of tibanna was a strong draw. Despite that, a rodian spoke up - the alien's initial speech was soon translated by the speaker system built into his armor: obviously this one had grown weary of dealing with humans who couldn't understand him. "What if one of us wants to jump out now?"

Harla fixed that eternally cold gaze on him, and a slow smile formed on her lips. Somehow the expression matched with a complete lack of mirth in her eyes was far more chilling than any glare, "that would be very unpleasant. We can't risk word getting out until the job's done." There was a momentary silence - the rodian kept his seat, hand at his belt, Harla stood her ground by the holodisplay. Neither reached for a blaster, but the thought was there.

"Good to know you're on point," the next bit of translation came from the rodian, and the confrontation was done. Harla looked over the rest of the group, "if we are ready, then I'll warm up the hyperdrive, and we wait for our signal. No more doubts?”

[14:17:10] Jira Thrane shook her head in the negative, for all purposes she was a woman of few words. She was tempted to put on her helmet to avoid any conversations; she highly doubted any comradere from the troops and it seemed even less likely from the scum. But stranger things had happened, and quite recently at that. She drummed her fingers over the top of her helmet. Now time to wait it out until the action started.

[14:29:26] Harla Dane didn't sit down with the rest of them, instead she stepped back towards that corridor leading to the cockpit, leaned back against the edge of the wall and crossed her arms over her chest. Some conversation started up - the troopers all knew each other, so there was a bit of chatter now the briefing was done, and the same was true for some of the scum. Subdued conversation on one side, boisterous on the other.

They didn't have long to wait, a chime played to warm of an incoming transmission. Harla turned to the console next to her on the wall, tapped it, and then just a moment later turned to the crowd, "we're on. Strap yourselves in for Hyperspace." Without another word, she stalked down the corridor to the cockpit, leaving the doors open as she went. Obviously, if someone wanted to sit with her there, she couldn't care less.

Her pilot's seat was modified, a helmet worked into the top of it. She settled on the seat, strapped herself in and then lowered the thing over her head, covering it completely. Most of the controls were worked into the pilot seat's arms, so she barely moved as she keyed in the commands for the change in orientation, and then drew the lever for the Hyperdrive. Outside, the stars turned into lines, then the lines into a tunnel [+]

[14:31:51]Harla Dane: Contrary to most holovids, the excitement didn't start off right away when they arrived at Dor Nameth. There was a quick burst from the repulsorlifts, then the background hum of the ship died down. Lights were turned off, even the heat died down, and the ship started to slowly cool off. Outside the viewport, Dor Nameth filled the nightsky, while the shipyard was just a speck of reflected sunlight, slowly drawing nearer. Jammers weren't active yet, so the cockpit was filled with the buzz of local chatter - shuttles and transports coming and going, docking bay clearances being granted. Routine, boring stuff. From listening in, it was easy to discern no one knew that an extra ship had just jumped in.

[14:39:24] Jira Thrane took that chime as her cue to don her helmet, locking it in place with a soft hiss as it became a self contained environment. She got up, throwing a hand sign that was commonly seen to mean good luck in the direction of the troopers; nothing. Ore than just a friendly overture that might be missed. Seeing Harla set off for the cockpit she opted to follow; she knew better than to offer to help even before she saw the layout of the controls that ensured the woman could control all the vital systems she needed. Quietly though she'd strap herself into the number two chair; it was as good a spot at any, and if they misjudged and this needed up being a trap set for all of them? At least she'd see the turbo laser fire that would bring them to a short end. When they dropped in she was content with what she saw, it seemed like the plan would hold together for a bit longer.

[14:45:52]Harla Dane: Closer, closer that light came. Before long the naked eye could discern one speck of light as the shipyard, another almost as bright as the Star Destroyer. The shapes started to come clearer. Surely they were coming close to the range for even passive sensors on a non-combat station - and just then Harla tapped a button on the arm of her chair, and all the system's communications were replaced with loud, grating white noise. A second tap and the cockpit stopped playing the local chatter.

"Contact in ten," she called out, the voice echoing from the cargo hold behind. The ship came alive, the main engines burned to match speed with the shipyard, which out the viewport was now off to the side and growing huge, fast. Despite the harsh burn of the engines to match speed, the moment of contact was still rough - it was easy to hear curses from the cargo hold, the sound of crats being dislodged, the groan of the ship's hull.

Harla beckoned to Jira, the only other one who'd moved to the cockpit with her - evidently everyone else was happier not being around her if they could help it - and got off her seat, hurrying down the main corridor. The republic troopers were already at work: the airlock on the ship had been forcibly matched with one on the station, and they were starting to burn through.[+]

[14:50:00]Harla Dane: In a moment, with a bright final detonation, the door was blasted in. An urgent voice came from the other side, "you are in violation of-" the phrase didn't go any further before one of the mercenaries shot right through the smoke. As the team surged through they found the airlock on the other side held a single man wearing a corporate security outfit - not even armor - with the mother of all blaster burns on his chest. Killed instantly.

Harla drew out a datapad, produced from it a connector remarkably similar to an astromech droid's, and linked the thing to the port beside the blast door at the end of the corridor. She stood well to the side as it worked, the team had some time to prepare themselves. She warned them with a nod, then tapped the datapad once it was done. The blast door irised open and immediately remarkably stiff blaster fire came from the other side. Clone Wars-era super battle droids. Six of them.

[15:25:33] Jira Thrane took Harla's lead when she beckoned her to follow, finally undocking the carbine blaster rifle from the hardpoint on her armor and making use of the sling to keep it within easy reach for use. Joining the assault team at the airlock she was on the forefront but wasn't one of the many that fired into the opening. As Harla went to work she had the nagging sensation that she wasn't quite prepared, biting her lip inside her helmet as she tried to deal with it. Her reaction seemed like magic from an outside point of view, letting her rifle drop to her middle, hanging from the sling as one arm reached up and over her shoulder for the narrow tube with a foregrip and trigger. It detached partially , coming up and around over her shoulder where it locked into place. As soon as the blastdoor opened and the blaster barrage started she barked over the coms in her. Suit to the immediate area, her voice modulated to sound metallic and genderless. "Clear!" With a squeeze of the trigger the recoiless launcher came to life, launching the missile from the tube with a flash of propellant. It soared through the hail of fire and past the droids, the boogie men of her childhood and detonated several feet behind them; enough to catch them in the blast while only basking the assault force with concussive blast that while disorienting for those not prepared on the front wouldn't be particularly dangerous. She tossed the spent Imperial emblazoned launch tube to the side.


[15:48:55]Harla Dane: Screams and groans came from the team’s side of the blast doors as the surprisingly stiff resistance got to work. In a tight corridor, with no room to manoeuvre and little cover to find, the super battle droids could really function as designed: killer machines, horrendously precise and powerful, even twenty years after manufacture. It was an ugly exchange until that call of ‘clear’ came, and the rocket shot through into the room. Most of the team ducked their heads away from the glare and the rush of air.

Ears still buzzing, they looked up to find most of the droids smoking and sparking. Two of them, lower halves melted into the bulkhead, were still trying to drag themselves up, orient their arms towards the team and fire. They never got the chance, as blaster fire put them down.

The team surged into the room, Harla moving directly towards one of the downed droids. She levelled one of her blaster pistols at the thing’s head and start firing repeatedly, not stopping until the there was no more than charred dust. “Explains why the security roster was so light. They automated that, too.” For someone whose plan had just started to go sideways, she sounded remarkably serene.[+]

[15:49:54]Harla Dane: The notion was, of course, also illegal to the extreme. Building or maintaining droids for combat had been outlawed since the clone wars. Apparently Zsinj had loosened those restrictions. “We should assume there is a similarly-sized party at each airlock at the very minimum. They haven’t had the time to organize. We mustn’t give them that time.” As she spoke, she moved to the next droid, repeating the same process. The other four had been rendered into irrecognizable slag, so she needn’t bother.

One of the mercenaries was left behind close by the airlock, smoke rising from a burned-out helmet. One of the republic troopers had a nasty wound to the belly, one of the other ones had him off to the side and was tending to it with a bacta patch. If the exchange had lasted much longer, losses would have been much heavier.

The corridor the Super Battle Droids had been stationed at was a staging ground, presumably for receiving supplies. It broadened after the initial few meters, and stretched onwards for nearly a hundred meters. At regular intervals, smaller corridors opened out to either side. Aurabesh lettering atop the corridors identified the docking bays down each one - and down some of them, noises could be heard. Voices in some, the clank of distant metal feet in others. At the far end of the broad thoroughfare was another tight blast door, a perfect mirror to the one they’d just gone through. There was no lettering on that one, but inwards was typically the right direction.

[16:21:30] Jira Thrane was cursing internally. She knew that this wasn't going to be a walk in the park but the droids had turned the situation sour for sure. Outwardly she remained the same, armored visage giving nothing away. She brought the carbine up to the ready for the next blast door. Inately she trusted the troopers to keep their cool and press forward, and was wary of the scum with them. Blast first and hard seemed to be a good idea from here on out. Surely not every hatch would have those droids; anyone smart would-- and she tripped that thought when she heard the clank of metal footsteps coming from one of the other cooridors. Someone was smart and sending forces forward. "Let's move then. There has to be a control point for the battle droids. " she hoped it was with the controls for those that controlled the loading droids.

[16:29:03]Harla Dane: They pressed onwards, the officer in charge of the republic troopers had a pair of them take cover by the wall at each of the corridors where the sound of approaching battle droids was closest, three such corridors in total, leaving behind almost half the platoon in the process, while the core of the force moved directly to the blast door at the end. Harla employed the same slicing data pad, jamming it in and then giving the thing time to work its magic. She was no slicer, but evidently she had the gear to perform as one to some degree.

Blaster fire started from one of those corridors, the steady, precise stream of fire that could only mean more droids. The two troopers to either side of it started returning the fire, and still the datapad was working, with no real information as to when it would be done. When the colors on its screen changed, Harla tapped the commands by the blast door and it irised open all at once.

Eight security personnel were on the other side, not even armored, armed only with simple blaster pistols. The room they were defending was a hub for transport tubes, and they’d tipped crates over - possibly shipped in via those tubes - to serve as cover. The exchange of blaster fire began, even while a second of those corridors behind lit up with blaster fire, and then the third. Four-way chaos.

[16:40:33] Jira Thrane felt sorry for the poor sods they were fighting. Though what could she do? Even if she managed to get a few down by switching to stun she knew that they likely wouldn't be left to recover by some of the more unsavory part of the lot. She returned fire with her carbine from the front , trusting the troopers to her back. The eight personel wouldn't stand a chance under the continuous fire.


15:39:42Harla Dane: The shootout continued for several minutes, and Harla kept safely out of the line of fire, weight set against the wall to herself, seeming so nonchalant and still as to be completely out of place in what was quickly coming to resemble a scene out of a war. Far behind them there was a scream as one of the troopers was hit, leaving only a single man to suppress the corridor he was at, but all of them continued their work, holding back what was likely a tide of oncoming droids.

To the front, the battle favored the invaders far more strongly. Security personnel, neither trained nor outfitted for this kind of confrontation, fell one by one. Only once half the group had been downed and the intensity of the firefight had decreased did Harla get involved. She leaned over to peek around the edge, looking at the enemy positions without even bothering to raise her blaster. Back into cover, she raised her blaster, took a moment, then leaned over and fired all at once. A single shot, and one more of the men inside crumpled with smoke rising from his chest. It wasn’t a trooper’s firing pattern, but an assassin’s.

A moment later, morale crumbled. Two of the men turned and dashed back, trying to get to cover closer to the room they’d been defending - the move got them both shot down easily, and the third man was felled soon after. That left the way clear through the room: it was a transport hub of sorts, several transport tubes to either side, some built wide to serve as personnel elevators, others were shaped for standard cargo containers. All the way at the back was an open blast door, the one the men had briefly tried to flee to. Lettering atop it declared the place simply as ‘Command’.



15:55:00Jira Thrane: The swagger that Jira had demonstrated at the beginning of the assault was gone, replaced the signs of a trained soldier. If she had been wearing the same armor as the troopers she would have blended in, spending her time taking cover with a limited field of fire and taking shots when her target popped up; almost like it was a game of skill than a fire fight. She missed the kill shot that Harla had executed, but when the remaining defenders ran back she was one of the team that fired. With the room cleared she advanced, motioning for a handful of the riff raff that made up the more villainous side of the assault to guard the tubes lest they be used to send reinforcements. She and the rest of the crew advanced to the open blast door, approaching more cautiously over the last few meters to make sure there wasn't someone set up inside. She hoped Harla was ready to override the droid controls otherwise this assault was going to end up not lasting much lingers.

16:06:56Harla Dane: From back in the main corridor, the sounds of trading blaster fire still continued, despite that Harla advanced behind the front of the assault without any appearance of haste, stalking through the carnage in the main transport room like it was everyday. She spoke a few quiet words to some of the mercenaries, gestured to some of the dead security personnel. The corpses were moved out of the way to make their former positions available.

Before long, Harla got into the main control room. With a station this automated, the sheer amount of data running through it was staggering, and that was represented by wall-long readouts and a full eight consoles, arranged almost like a warship's bridge. Given how the place was deserted, it is likely that all of the former occupants had just been mowed down outside. Harla set that datapad to work at the main console, and before too long the holointerfaces went from an angry red to a blue, all options and interactions unlocked.

"Hm. One of them must have been very clever. They had the combat droids deactivate their wireless data systems before coming out to fight us." She spoke it with that same calm and relaxation. "Didn't have the time to get to all the other droids, though." She began to work with the system, tapping through commands. "I could have droids pulled out of all the work areas, start fetching out Tibanna and carry it over. Or we could make living cover out of them, and try to actually win this firefight." Harla raised her gaze, looking to Jira and the lieutenant in charge of the troopers, waiting for their input. The man vacillated just a moment.



16:17:53Jira Thrane: "Split the droids up," Jira's augmented voice came over speaker in her helmet, "Tibanna is no good to us dead, and leaving empty handed is just going to make our lives difficult." The blonde looked over the display, seeing if she could find any map information that might help her in the long run. "A 70-30 split for loading and cover. " she glanced between Harla and the LT. that would maybe buy them enough to make this worth it, and to get out alive. If Harla could split the workpool up. She wasn't sure how good her tool set that she brought along was.

16:25:23Harla Dane: The lieutenant, for all that he was well-trained and not completely green, was newer; like most lieutenants especially at this point in the war. The conflict had been obvious on his face, but after Jira gave her suggestion, he threw his weight behind it, agreeing it was a solid idea.

Harla looked the consoles over. "Hm. That sounds reasonable." With a few taps she brought up the full roster of worker droids, she simply drew about 70% out without even looking at their identifiers and sent a new command to them. Then she repeated the process for the rest of the pool. "I'll have them push Tibanna into the transport tubes, it gets delivered just outside here. Once it starts filling up outside, I shift most of the loaders to carry it across. We just need to hold for that long."

The shipyard was structured simply, and looking at the map at one of those big screens let Jira get a quick handle on it. Each floor was arranged like a circle, this one in particular was set up for the human staff. All the airlocks and loading bays were on it, and there had been a security team of six super battle droids at each airlock - once the team had pushed in here, those battle droids were just diverted to start trying to stomp them out from all sides. There weren't any more combat models shown anywhere, which meant the transport tubes were clear, as were the majority of the corridors leading off from the main hall where the firefight was still on.

"I'll work on getting the narrow-band signal out for our escorts out of here, and see what else I can do to slow them down from here," even as she spoke, she began tapping commands that shut down airlocks and blastdoors throughout the station, ensuring they'd only have this line of corridors to worry with. "Our cover-droids will arrive in a couple minutes.”



16:34:47Jira Thrane: (No more loading up excess tibanna in shuttles then? Did I get that right?)Jira nodded her affirmative before heading back down the cooridor. She lacked the tools to do any assisting in the command room with her, and being ready for a fight she would likely do better assisting the rear guard. she would even get a few of the non troopers to press with her, taking up position at one of the intersections with the troopers still stationed there and easily doubling their firepower. They just needed a few more minutes…



16:41:04Harla Dane: With all of their manpower on that one main corridor, the team had the chance to recover control of the situation - if just for a while. The lieutenant wisely ordered the men who had been leaning against the edge of those entrances to get back and replaced them with fresh personnel - Jira and the the mercenaries included - while giving his men a brief chance to patch up if they'd been hit anywhere, reload weapons and otherwise get themselves in top shape for the next round of fighting.

Each of the passages the droids were coming from curved slowly, such that from either corner, a person could only see down maybe 30 meters before the angle became too steep to see. There were the carcasses of downed battle droids on the floor, while one of the things had only its smart exposed and was firing constantly down, suppressive fire. Hints of motion and the play of shadow - as the things were backlit - made it clear there were more of them there, getting prepared to advance.

And meanwhile, the transport hub started to get packed with carbonited tibanna. The tubes would stop, a droid would unceremoniously push the case off, then it was back away. The process was rapid, and one had to assume most of the work at this point was actually dragging the Tibanna from storage to the tubes, which was happening out of sight.



16:50:15Jira Thrane: Without a chance to get a good shot down the corridors it was turning into a game of exchanging suppressive fire. If only she had packed more explosives! She still had the blast charge, and while she could arm it and toss it, that sort of firepower was perhaps a bit over kill... that and trying to launch the heavy payload down thirty meters was just a bit beyond a reasonable expectation. Still, alternating firing with the crew around her they could hold out for a few more minutes while they waited. She could hear the sounds of the transport tubes running and depositing container after container at this point; now if she could just be lucky enough for the plan to go back on the rails things would be great! She whipped herself back around the corner just in time to avoid taking a blast to the chest, the wall of the cooridor behind where she had been exposed being scored black.



17:14:40Harla Dane: The comm pinged, both Jira's and that of the lieutenant, a message inbound from Harla down at the command room, "I think I have a means to speed up pushing what Tibanna is already on the transport hub onto the ship. And possibly give you lot a momentary edge." She paused for a moment. Behind her, the sound of the consoles pinging and chiming could be heard, a stark contrast to the sound of gunfire from Jira's vicinity.

"I can weaken the Inertial Compensators, then give the station a bit of a spin. It is a straight line outwards from the transport hub to the cargo hull, so that should push the tibanna most of the way over, though slowly. And dangerous for people on the way. Also, the droids are unlikely to react quickly to the change, you should see some of them falling towards the outer wall. An opportunity to blast them down. If we are in agreement, we only need to synchronize me triggering this."

By then, the transport hub was quite crowded with the big, heavy, floating squares of frozen tibanna. More were coming by the second. All of those just speed off through the hall they were holding could very likely mean people getting smacked by one of the things, if they weren't very careful about it, but the centrifugal force would push most of the loads ultimately towards their ship.



17:24:14Jira Thrane: "L-T, get people out of the way and let's do it. " her actual voice would buZ back over the commlink, not being broadcast outside of her helmet. Given how the man had deferred to her earlier she had stepped up to take command, even if she wasn't one of the NR troops. Locally she called out. To those fighting in the hallway; there likely wasn't enough time to explain everything but if they had half a brain they could hopefully get the plan. "Get ready to push; you'll know the signal when it happens. The main cooridor isn't going to be safe." It was now or never, right? She braced herself and readied her weapon, nodding to the merc that had been managing cover in this choke point with her.

0:03:10Harla Dane: In the control room, the first step was for Harla to trigger the rush of the droids Jira had suggested be set as living cover for the firing teams: now was the best moment to use them, so she sent them all in. Next, she turned to the console where she'd found the more interesting bit of information since she arrived in the station: the cracked-open ISD's systems, slaved to the shipyard's. It made sense, for the sake of running systems tests, and it yielded her this opportunity now. The reactor, exposed to the vacuum of space out there, had been warmed up and now its power was pumped to the ISD's thrusters. At the same time, Harla deactivated the space station's stationkeeping repulsorlifts, and dialed the inertial compensator on their floor of the station down almost to zero.

Tied together by dozens of umbilicals and gantries, the Star Destroyer's hull tried to move forward under the power of its thruster, but had the station strapped to it. The unbalance instead caused it to start veering sideways, spinning around the station - and starting the station itself spinning. Harla braced herself at the console, as the accelerations were weaker but very unpredictable in the center of the station where she was. Everywhere else it was a sudden, outwards push, just as strong as the downwards pull of artificial gravity. The Tibanna crates went speeding through the hallway, banging into each other and into anything left in their path.

Just before the surge of motion happened, the world's most bizarre impromptu army of droids moved into the line of fire, having been making their way from the transport tubes. They were mostly very simple models, and served as excellent cannon fodder, taking shot after shot from the super battle droids before collapsing. In Jira's corridor there was even a gonk droid, remarkably sturdy as he pushed the line forward almost all the way to the battle droids.

At that most inconvenient moment, with a clear line of advance all the way to knife-fighting range with the droids, the station's spin kicked in, together with the inertial compensator being shut off. The battle droids, not warned of what was coming and with poor processors to deal with unexpected circumstances, overbalanced to the side and right into the line of fire, completely exposed. Taking down the harried things was almost too easy. The loud clangs of impact spoke of when the tibanna banged into the bulkheads and sides of the blastdoors at the hall, already propelled almost all the way to the Heretic.

"The next cargo bay over from corridors three and two hold shuttles. If you can drag extra Tibanna there, do so. If not, push as much as we can into the Heretic. It's time we got out of here." Her voice came over the broad comm band, audible to everyone in the team.



0:19:29Jira Thrane: Jira advanced with two of the troopers to finish off the toppled over droids in her hallway, the sizzling sound of plasma melting armored shells and servos.; and from the sound of it other groups had done the same to comparable measures of success. With H arla's message broadcast she turned to look over her shoulder. There were a few easy to grab containers at the opening of the corridor. " Can any of you pilot?" She asked the set of three troopers with her, one gave a confidant nod. "Then let's go!" Not another word needed to be said. they each could get the containers moving and run... or at least stagger over the remains of their enemies making their way to the hanger bay. Jira and one trooper lead point while the two behind them followed close behind, carrying and pulling along as much of their loot as they could.

0:25:03Harla Dane: After a few minutes, time enough for the teams to get the most out of the opportunity, Harla kicked the inertial compensators in their floor back to full. Even then, a bit of that sideways force could still be felt, and it was perceptible that it was building up continuously. It wouldn't be long before it was a dangerous centrifugal force, overwhelming the compensators completely.

From elsewhere in the station Jira could still hear distant blasterfire, which could mean one of the teams was still engaged - but it was nothing like the torrent of noise that had been around instants before. Her trio advanced rapidly until they arrived at a main hall similar to the one they had departed from earlier, though the vessel docked at the end of it this time around would be an imperial shuttle, not the Heretic. Right as they rounded the corner, a sudden surprise - one final Super battle droid had been set to guard right by the doorway, and as the trio came in with their cargo, it opened up. The thing was completely exposed, yes, but then so were they.

0:41:15Jira Thrane: She had been hoping for multiple shuttles, but if there was only one then so be it. The droid was a problem though. Given the unwieldy nature of using a two handed weapon in one hand both her and the Sergeant running point reacted slower, taking a fraction of a second too long to draw a bead and the droid got off the first shot, striking one of the men in a glancing fashion before the return fire managed to first blast off the firing arm and then a leg. It was gunned down before it could get a second burst going. The trooper was injured and they were down a fighting man man, but he was still up, leaning against his repulsor lift fitted container. They managed to get to the shuttle, Jira bursting in through the docking ring and going left, the sergeant going right to make sure there wasn't someone already on board!



0:54:55Harla Dane: The ship was empty, and by all appearances had been for several days. It was a standard delta-class, doubtless part of the complement for the ISD docked at the station, moved out and docked separately to allow for the sheer scale of work that was being done to the Star Destroyer. It was unoccupied, and had plentiful room for the Tibanna they'd brought in. Perhaps other parties had done the same and taken other shuttles, but this trio had for sure carried more than their fair share of the weight in the final moment, injuries and all.

Outside, the other half of the heist had already been underway while the team had been too busy with their own troubles to even notice. At the moment that the shuttles’ systems start up and Jira first gets a look out of the shipyard with its sensors, she can see a system abuzz with activity.

Nearby, there are a dozen slowly-expanding clouds of debris, the size and direction make it clear they once were starfighters, recently vaporized. Those responsible are still close by: a full squadron of Republic Starfighters, currently flying in broad, idle patterns around the mess, attentive in case any more hostiles arrive.

There is more activity: most of the other ships that had been docked with the station had had their docking clamp deactivated, and with the station's spin, that sent them flying away from it. They drifted cold and silent in space, but not for long. Two republic shuttles were busily traveling from one vessel to the next, and within moments of docking, the formerly-dead vessel would come alive and start on a course to jump out of system. The shuttle would then continue to the next one.

Slightly more jarring was the pair of BFF-1 bulk freighters, the same slapped-together models that Jira had seen before the mission. While she powered up the shuttle, they finished docking with a couple of blastboats - one each - and in a similar fashion, the ships lit up and flew off, though not in the same direction the rebels were going. After that was done, the two freighters started to roam around the shipyard, a weak tractor beam activating to drag loose tie fighters into their hold. They were prioritizing the best ships the Star Destroyer had in its cargo holds, making bee-lines for the interceptors and bombers, and only picking up the base ties if they were on the way.

In the command room, the dangerous nature of Harla's work became increasingly evident. Almost the entire team had boarded ships and were ready to depart, leaving her isolated at the command room. That was only half of it. A Star Destroyer was meant to be operated by thousands. The thruster and reactor systems alone required crews of hundreds to run. She'd forced them to activate, but they were anything but stable. Now most of the team was out of the way, she keyed in a few more commands to the Star Destroyer, then finally got her slicing datapad and departed the command room. The centrifugal force by then made the sensation of walking out a lot akin to starting downhill on a steep hill, and the longer she went, the worse it got, with sudden yanks to the sides as the Star Destroyer's unstable acceleration made for far from a stable ride. She ran the length of those corridors, banging into bulkheads here and there, and actually having to jump past one of the side-corridors, when a sudden pull of acceleration had turned that wall, from her perspective, into the new floor. Half-functional droids were flying around the bedlam, and the torso of a super battle droid even flew past, desperately trying to aim and fire at her.

Finally she got to the airlock, leaping through the rest of the way. The hand recognition inside the airlock triggered, closing it behind her. If not for that bit of security, she had every certainty the team would have left her behind. As it was, she was bruised, battered and exhausted, but unharmed.

Jira saw the final ship come free from the shipyard: the heretic itself, soon coming alive to start accelerating away. It kept to the same course as the republic personnel were on

1:09:37Jira Thrane: Jira quickly went through the bare minimum of what needed to be done to depart while the two troopers helped patch up and stow away their ill gotten gains. Bye the time one of them was free enough to help they were undocking, gracefully pulling away from the station while coordinates were being input into the nav computer by her copilot. So much for a walk in the park like this had been billed as! By all accounts though this outcome was what the woman expected. With their fourth man stable and ships leaving she would make the jump to the rendezvous point. Only taking her helmet off once the streak of stars graced her view port.

1:27:12Harla Dane: The final commands Harla had keyed into the system went into full effect just moments after the Heretic detached from the station. The Star Destroyer's reactor and drive systems were set to maximum output - still completely unsupervised - and the shipyard's repulsorlifts were deactivated, stopping the station-keeping bursts they had been doing regularly to compensate, best it could, for the wayward acceleration the Star Destroyer had been imposing on it.

Like a spinning top, the Station and Star Destroyer danced around and around, spinning around each other but also gaining an ever-increasing wobble in their orbit. It didn't take a navicomputer to plot out the eventual outcome of that motion, as there was only one way it could go: eventually, that wobble brought the station briefly down deep enough to drag against the atmosphere of the planet below. At that point, the fate for the station and ship were sealed.

They spun around a few more times, but each rotation brought them in closer contact with the planet, and the fourth time they touched atmosphere, it had been with the Star Destroyer's cracked-open front. The air arrested the spin, and the ship and station started to dive into the atmosphere, multiple times faster than its gravity could ever pull it.

Fire shot out all across the two, hot enough to melt durasteel. Every loose part of them was peeled loose and burned up, the opened-up Star Destroyer had more flaw points than imaginable and it peeled open like a monstrous fruit, the white-hot reaction core exposed to the maddening heat and friction of re-entry.

The two superdense, super-rapid objects slamming to the surface would have been bad enough, but when they were still miles above the surface below, the Star Destroyer's reactor finally gave out and went critical. It's full power output discharged in a single second, a star being momentarily born right inside the planet's atmosphere. The team had been on the planet's night-side, so once the initial flash of light passed, they were given the grim spectacle of a spreading wall of fire, circular in shape and as high as the troposphere. The night-side had been lit up with the night-lights of the cities and towns below, and as that wall of fire spread, it left behind only dust and darkness.

The wave of incineration annihilated a quarter of an entire hemisphere. The supersonic winds tore at buildings and flung debris halfway around the world. Some cities managed to get local shields online in time and were spared the devastation, but anyone who had read of a major asteroid impact knew that was little comfort. The clouds of ash would inevitably push this world to a new ice age. It was a dead planet, it just didn't know it yet.

The Heretic was still in the system by the time the 'fireworks' had mostly died down, then jumped out. A few minutes later, it emerged at the rendezvous point arranged with the Republic's forces.