The doors separating the corridors they were fighting in dropped with a suddenness. Everyone stared in odd curiosity; initially taken aback by the abrupt silence. Moments ago, blasfire raced back and forth between the rebels of Rancor company and the mercenaries of the Majestic. But now, everything was quiet. Both sides stared at a black door obstructing their path from continuing their fight.

“Sergeant Duron!” Captain Karada yelled. “I believe Sergeant Paltoy needs a breach. Do you have any?”

Sergeant Duron, also immobilized by the sudden appearance of the door blocking their path stuttered to attention. The Captain’s words, brought him out of his fog. “Uh…yes….yes, sir.” He patted himself down as if looking for something. Then pulled out a small charge. He handed it to Corporal Martus. “Go make a hole, Dev,” the section leader ordered his demolitionist.

“Roger that, sergeant,” the corporal grabbed the charge, then ran forward to where second section was still crouched behind whatever cover they found.

“Sergeant Paltoy,” Corporal Martus spoke to the section leader. “I am going to blow a hole in this door, please have your people move back.”

Sergeant Paltoy also stunned, but looking for a way out of their current situation. “Yes! Will do Corporal! Thank you!” She smiled when she realized what the sapper was going to do. She turned to her section, “everyone! Get up and move back! We’re going to blow the door!”

As the section pulled back closer to the rest of the platoon, which had by now entered the ship through the boarding tube. Blast marks marred the walls and passageways around the first platoon members. A few mercenary corpses littered the corridor they hunkered down in. They were in the fight and ready to move forward. But this sudden appearance of a door halted their progress. Captain Karada was annoyed with the blockage.

Major Tavik came through the hole, taking a position to Mosh’s right. “Don’t worry Captain, the other platoons are experiencing the same problem. The third platoon has already broken through and are in a fight near the Venator’s bridge. Lieutentant Lomax has been hit and Sergeant Felidron has taken over the Sapper Platoon temporarily. I have lost contact with the second platoon leader. He has sent me no sitreps. Blow your hole and carry on.”

Major Tavik looked at the Sapper NCO, “Sergeant, how many of those charges do you have on you?”

The sergeant looked at the major, stood at attention and replied, “Sir, I have three additional charges and Corporal Martus has four. We have only the seven between us.”

“That should be sufficient for now. Carry on, sergeant.” Major Tavik then turned away from the battle and listened to a report from Captain Kruger.

His receiver crackled in his ear. Captain Karada listened as well, ”the sappers have breached the inner door. The Chakaar operators are here. They are under fire. We are backing them up. Helping to defend the hangar bay against the mercenaries.”

“Well done, Lorne,” Major Tavik answered. “Link up with Captain Besk if you can find him. Give him a status update on our progress. Tavik, out.” @HeySeuss

With these words spoken, the charge against the door impeding the first platoon’s progress detonated, leaving a rather large hole in the corridor, rendering several people in the second section temporarily deaf. Sergeant Paltoy had enough for thought to run towards the opening and toss a thermal detonator inside while lasblasts resumed their passage back and forth through the opening. The second section took up positions and continued their advancing fire.

The blast of the breaching charge and subsequent thermal detonator were enough to momentarily stun the mercenaries and hand the second section a brief opportunity to exploit the advantage. A few members ran through the door, taking covered positions along the side walls, returning fire.

Captain Karada moved closer to get a better look. He motioned for Sergeant Li Pendragon to follow him. He wanted the first section to be ready to fight through the second section. Mosh turned to his first section leader, “Sergeant, be prepared to take your section through the door. Second section will drop a few more thermals on them and then you and your people charge in, got it!?”

“Yes sir,” Sergeant Pendragon responded.

With the orders given, a lasblast hit Mosh in the side of the helmet knocking him to the ground. He was stunned, but otherwise unhurt. He rose to a kneeling position and adjusted his position so he wasn’t immediately in the line of fire again.

“Man that smarts,” Captain Karada muttered as he checked his helmet and his head. Aside from the blast marks on the side, he was otherwise unharmed.

“Keep pushing forward Mosh. We need to clear this ship,” Major Tavik spoke without asking him about his condition. The man saw the first platoon commander go down, but was just as caught up in the moment as everyone else.

“Yes sir. Will do. Yes, I am fine,” Captain Karada responded with a neutral tone. ‘Bastard!’ he thought to himself.

Major Tavik turned away from the first platoon commander. He called over the company net, “Sergeant Major, have Sergeant Dumas and Corporal Delmont bring up more breaching charges and thermal detonators. All four platoons will need a resupply before too long. The crew of the Majestic have dropped blast doors, blocking our paths. We have been able to blast our way through, but will need more explosives to continue our mission. Check with the ship’s crew. See if we can get some help pushing the charges and detonators forward, over.”

“Aye, aye, sir,” came the response from the Company Sergeant. The sailors in the Combat Information Center behind the bridge heard the transmission and were made aware of the current obstacle in front of Rancor Company’s advance.

@CaptainBritton@Lauder@POOHEAD189

"Check your weapons! Now's your chance to load up!" Called out Senior Sergeant Upard, clutching his own A280 and checking the remaining shots in the magazine as he moved with the column that consisted of the first section. The Lieutenant moved at the front, his own rifle bouncing in his grasp as he glanced around the dull grey corridor.

"I want all auto riflemen at the front! Riflemen, organize into fireteams, breach and clear! Sappers cover their asses!" Trad enunciated, rejoining the first section as the riflemen split off in groups of two or three and moved to various bulkheads connecting to adjoining hatches, until suddenly the two doors on either end of the corridor slammed down, and locked with a hiss and whirr.

"Shit." Trad muttered, troops around him glancing at the recent development with collective scowls. "Sappers!" Trad called out amongst the disgruntled and confused mass of troops that once were preparing to breach and clear. "Get those doors open ASAP! The rest of you, get back to work! We got a schedule to follow!"

The sappers went to work, a man detaching from the squad and heading to each tightly locked hatch and producing a block charge and timer. With ease and skill they began to fasten the blocks to the weak-points of the doors, information which they had been told over and over in their own briefing. Mid-section, along the line that connects them.

Meanwhile, the riflemen went to work. Doors were pryed, shot, and beat open, and scattered shots rang out, mercenaries that had been hiding out being trapped like tuna in a can and shot dead without mercy. Though, it did not go without losses. A single man had been gunned down, a blaster bolt taken directly to the torso, a fatal shot. One more, a shot to the leg, a result of a panicked and trapped mercenary spraying wildly upon their disturbance. Some rushed to assist and others continued.

By the time each room had been cleared, the charges were placed. "Fire in the hole!" The sapper section leader shrieked, and all the troops ducked into the recently cleared rooms or stuck to the walls of the corridor. Either way, two explosions raged not seconds between eachother, and both doors collapsed inwards as the mechanism was twisted and bent horribly.

The sections were wrangled by their respective leaders and pushed forwards at the command of the Lieutenant, and Trad hissed into his communications device. "Initial breach has been successful. We're clearing out bunkhouses and moving sternwards as of current. However, we've encountered dropped blast doors. We've expended two of our eight blasting charges and no doubt we will need more before long." The acknowledgement of the Company Sergeant satiated his concern and he continued his march as the Second Platoon moved ever closer to their objective.

The Y-Wing was, in Kytra’s opinion, an under-appreciated technological marvel. Most people looked at it and saw its poor maneuverability, its maintenance heavy weapons and power systems and relatively poor forward firepower and thought it was a failed attempt to make a versatile bomber. Measured on the ideal of a bomber that could match a fighter in a traditional dogfight, that assessment was true.

But that was where the traditional assessments were wrong. The Y-Wing had a twin-power plant set up - the cause of its heat problems, but also its biggest advantage. The layout and raw energy output allowed the pilot to switch power focuses quickly and efficiently. It charged shields more powerful than those on the X-Wing. It ran a dual targeting system that was faster and more accurate than any other fighter on either side that Kytra knew about. It allowed a fully turreted secondary weapon, and it powered the massive engines that let the heavy craft match an X-wings acceleration.

Flying it required a different skillset to most fighters. The pilot needed to be a good multi-tasker to manage the power allocations, turret and targeting systems all at once. They had to be cool under pressure, because getting hit was more of a ‘when’ than an ‘if’ and when it happened they had to be ready to adapt. If you did, they could keep it flying despite damage that would turn a smaller fighter in so much space dust.

Kytra had mused on this in the early segment of the battle as she kept the squadron back. She hoped the new pilot in the squadron had really understood it when she had briefed him earlier. But now was the time to focus - now was the time to engage. The fighters had engaged the vast majority of the TIE fighters now, leaving a largely open corridor towards the light cruisers that provided escort for the Majestic.

So far, those light cruisers had avoided engaging properly, the close confines of the battle making their larger weapons risky to employ for fear of hitting the massive Venator. They were both moving away from their echelon formation now, heading on a long circular arc to cut off the escape routes of The Keep.

“Alright Thranta, we’re going in. Target the lead Arquitens. Load proton torpedoes. Flight one engage first to drop the shield, flight two finish them off.” A series of acknowledgements came back to her over the com, and she gunned the engines to begin the run. Below her, the ship vibrated as the magazine rotated and, with a dull thunk, rammed a pair of proton torpedoes into the launch tubes. The squadron was armed with a salvo of ion torpedoes, but it would be a waste to use them on an Arquitens when they had the power to disable a Star Destroyer.

As the Arquitens grew larger before her, Kytra set shield power to double front and activated her targetting computer. It smoothly slid in place over one eye and started beeping to inform her of its status. It would tell her the ideal moment to fire.

“TIEs incoming!” Lieutenant Barizan urgently stated over the coms. Second flight hadn’t started their run yet, so had a little more situational awareness.

“Stay on target. Roll and show ‘em the sides.” Kytra ordered. She rolled her ship to present the slimmer and better protected side profile. At the same time, she heard the turret rotating to take aim. It was wired to allow her astromech - Gizka - to control it. Otherwise it had to be preset to specific fire angles which, of course, reduced its versatility.

[THERE ARE X-WINGS CHASING THOSE TIES. CAN I FIRE ANYWAY?]

The incoming communication from the trigger happy droid annoyed Kytra a little. The droid had no respect for fire vectors. She didn’t respond directly to it, but instead gave orders to her flight. “Hold your turret fire until the X-wings are clear.” Before quickly switching to comms with Kal. “Alter your run to put down some turret fire on those TIEs while they chase me.”

Moments later, as the light cruiser loomed large before her, the targeting computer beeped out its readiness. Kytra squeezed the trigger then pulled sharply in one smooth motion, adjusting her shields to full rear as she did so. The flight followed suit, only slightly out of sync due to the new arrangement of pilots. Behind them, there were six colossal flashes as the heavy warheads impacted the cruiser. Shield were demolished and armor scored and seared. The ship skewed to the side, clearly having suffered some damage to its thrusters, but it was still quite intact. For now. Kytra only saw it as dots meeting on her scope, followed by the cruisers status readout altering to show the vulnerable state of the Arquitens.

Now it was up to the second flight to finish the job.

The refugee shuttle rocked as it came out of hyperspace above the desert planet. The shuttles definitely weren’t top of the line, but they did their job, even if the ride was rough. There was a short wait as the shuttle approached the Imperial cruiser and was cleared for entry once the proper codes were exchanged. Lohke sat atop an abandoned supply crate along the wall of the shuttle, peering out of the small viewport. He watched the inky blackness of space transition into cloud coverage and then clear away to reveal Abafar’s orange skies and its infamous desert, the Void.

Staring at the planet surface as the shuttle made its way toward the Rhydonium mining facility, if it could be called that, Lohke saw why the desert was called the Void; it stretched on with not so much as a sand dune or farmstead. The “workers”, the people of Abafar, were no more than slaves to the Empire now. As all slaves tend to do, they grew tired of the Empire’s boot to their throats and called for aid. Apparently there was a lone rebel cell operating on Abafar that had made contact with the Alliance, so the higher ups decided to send Lohke to make contact with the cell and gauge the situation. They awaited his report to make a decision on sending aid to the rebels of Abafar.

The shuttle touched down with a jolt that forced most of the refugees to steady themselves before making their way to the exit ramp, where their identification would be verified and their persons checked by the troopers. The people were desperate enough to come to this wasteland to work under the Empire as slaves. Lohke grabbed his satchel and followed the line of refugees to the aft ramp. He held his arm out to the troopers to be scanned as he stepped forward. There were six total around the landing pad; two to scan and pat the refugees down and the other four to impose the fear of the Empire in their sand-stained armor and loaded blasters.

The scanner read Lohke’s ID band and came back with his falsified history. He was operating under the alias, Lavoz Bola. Lavoz, Lav for short, was an incoming supervisor for the mining facility. He wouldn’t be treated much better than the actual workers, but he’d be afforded just enough leeway to make contact with the rebel cell. Next came the other trooper’s search of Lohke’s person and his bag. Nothing but clothes and a measly pile of credits.

“Report to Section Three’s Foreman,” the first trooper said in the usual mechanical voice.

“And where would they be?”

The trooper checked his datapad before replying, “Section six-oh-two. Follow the markers. Next.”

Lohke left the landing pad to make his way into the mines. The markers were easy enough to follow through the facility. As he passed through the mines, he could feel more than see the workers bristle as he passed them. They were weary of a newcomer who wasn’t led into the facility in a line, as that could only mean he wasn’t a new worker but someone who would be over them in some way. He ignored them for the time being.

When he came to the marker with “602” shining on it, he began looking around for the foreman, who came in the form of a male Besalisk. He was standing on a catwalk above the workers, peering down upon them. In these mines he was the one in charge, he had the power. As Lohke walked up the catwalk to the foreman, he could see the pistol strapped to his belt. He let his eyes linger for a moment on the weapon.

“Oo are you,” the foreman asked in between chewing on the end of a stale-looking cigara.

“New supervisor for Section Three. You the Section Three foreman?”

“Aye, that I am. ID band,” the foreman demanded, bringing up his scanner in one of his four hands. Lohke held out his arm to the Besalisk like he had with the troopers. The scan came back green and presented the same falsified information as the first scan had.

“Lavoz Bola?”

“That’s me. Lav for short though.”

“Right. Head over to the bunkhouse. You get a bunk to yourself. You’ll be over Bunk Eight. Last supervisor was dumb enough to let his skin get exposed to the Rhydonium.”

Lohke nodded and made to go find his bunk.

“Oh, and you don’t get one o’ these, “ the foreman patted his blaster, “strictly for the Foremen and troopers.”

Lohke nodded again and left the foreman behind to chuckle to himself as he relished in imposing his power over the workers in the mine, a product of having the Empire impose its will on the galaxy more and more.

Cordo watched as the Y-Wings closed in on the Arquitens-Cruisers. "Reserve power to the engines, if we punch it we can sti-" at that point, her scope started to beep as 4 X-Wings closed in. "Break formation!" she commanded as a hail of blaster-fire attempted to shred them. Luckily, Bigdog and Rainmaker managed to break and quickly turned to begin their counter-attack. Cordo, on the otherhand was going to try and make it to those Y-Wings, even if she was planning to defect, she needed to at least convince the commanders that she was still on their side, otherwise she risked becoming top-priority target of both sides.

It was then that she saw a hail of blaster-bolts stream down in front of her. "Dammit, can't intercept the Y-Wings, moving to eliminate the X-Wings." she grunted into her comm

*Negative, intercept the first wave of bombers* replied the comm. By this point, she had already brought the fighter around and was screaming headlong towards the X-Wing. She took several shots at it, clipping one of the blaster cannons and leaving the X-Wing with only 3. It proceeded to fire back, but with a swift roll and maneuver, she had avoided it.

"I will not be able to intercept the first wave before they drop their payload. The second wave I can intercept and without having to worry about being shot down if I can down these 4 in the next 83 seconds." she replied as she rolled the craft again to scare the pilot of the X-Wing by bringing the hexagonal wingtip within inches of his Astromech that poked out the top. The comm seemed silent for a moment, Cordo using this moment to gain distance. She then saw the beeping of her scope again, this time to indicate that another X-Wing had just got a target-lock on her.

*Proceed* came the reply. They had learned first-hand that when she told them what she was doing, then she'd do it and succeed with flying colours. Inside the cock-pit, the pilot of the X-Wing smirked as he bagged his first kill of the day... Or so he thought. Cordo, in the cockpit flicked a few switches to quickly shut off her port engine. With the amount of power her starboard engine was putting out to keep her at the immense speed she was at, the craft span turning it around like a top. She judged the spin of the craft and a single shot from the laser-cannon lanced out. The bewildered X-Wing pilot had no idea what was happening, until one of his engines was hit and exploded. He had had his Deflectors in his rear-arc to keep any of her wing-men off him and now that had cost him his ship's manoeuvrability. The pilot sent out a message as he saw her regain control of the TIE with relative ease.

"My Port-Ventral engine is dead. This crazy pilot just pulled a stunt I've never even thought of before... We're dealing with an Ace. Pulling out." The pilot knew that his R2 would only be able to keep his fuel from going to the damaged engine for so long, if that ignited he'd be done-for, and with only 3 working engines and an un-uniform thrust, he wasn't going to be any more use out here.

Cordo, on the otherhand couldn't help but laugh as she watched the Pilot limp off. "Better luck next time." she said, before beginning to make an attack run on the second wave of Y-Wings, since 1 X-Wing had bugged out, another was missing one of it's cannons and the other 2 were tied up by Bigdog and Rainmaker. "TP-319 moving to Intercept the second wave." she said, as her Fighter sceamed towards the next wave. She'd have to be careful, as slow as they were, their blasters were more than enough to turn her fighter into a lump of scrap in less than a second. Plus the Ion Turrets and their payload of torpedoes. She approached fast before dodging an incoming stream of Ion Cannon fire. Rolling, she set herself up for the next run at them.

In an instant, the ship burst from Attack speed into Full-Throttle, approaching the Y-Wings at over 1.5x the Y-Wings max-speed, the craft rolled so that it could approach the Y-Wing's ventrally, the TIE gave a burst of cannon-fire against the 3 of them. Not enough to penetrate their shields, but enough to give the pilots something to worry about. She then opened a comm-channel to the Rebels "Rebel Squadron, this is Lieutenant Cordo Monnassas of the 493rd TIE Fighter Company, Leader of Obsidian Squadron. Stand down and leniency shall be shown. Refuse and i'm going to have to do something that I have been wanting to do for quite some time." she said. Of course, with her nature, the commander back on the Gozanti knew (or thought they knew) that she meant stop toying with them and blow them out of the sky. She had no such plans in mind.

While the handful of men from the Sapper platoon assisted the Special Operations platoon in the hangar bay, Captain Karada’s first platoon continued to fight their way toward the bow of the ship. They found every passageway blocked as they pushed forward. The sappers took the time to place charges and blow out the blast doors. After each explosion, there was an ensuing firefight.

“We may as well remain together with all these obstacles between us and our objective,” Captain Karada spoke to his section leaders over the radio. “First Squad take the lead. Sergeant Paltoy, cover the right in case a door should open.

Sergeant Pendragon’s section increased fire forward as they advanced into the mercenary’s view. Within seconds of the first section’s advance into the enemy fire, Trooper Vijay Aidasani, a Kuati native took a laser blast square in the chest. It sent him flying back across the floor. His body now lifeless and unmoving. A pair of third section soldiers quickly pulled Trooper Aidasani’s corpse back out of the line of fire. They didn’t know he was dead until they began checking his vitals.

Corporal Kramuk, the third assistant section leader looked up at Captain Karada shaking his head in a slow morose manner, indicative of finding a dead comrade. “Well, we can’t expect for all of us to live,” the first platoon commander spoke out of turn. He was hurt by the loss, but knew it was possible. This is the nature of the game, when you live by the gun, often enough, you die by the gun. “Corporal, get your section into the fight. Reinforce the first section!” The Captain ordered the section forward. Maybe they could get two sections to focus on the enemy.

As soon as the third section entered the fray, Trooper Ananya Corbo, a female Alderaanian soldier took a shot to the face, causing blood to splatter across two of her section mates. When the realized what had happened; the horror hit them hard. The two vomited on the floor where Ananya once stood. Seconds after Trooper Corbo fell, Captain Mosh Karada took a laser shot in the throat decapitating his head from his body. The four section soldiers were near their platoon commander when he felt and were mortified to see the man they looked up to lost in such a manner.

Major Tavik caught up with the platoon just as Captain Karada lost his head. He also was taken aback. The Captain was someone he respected. They may not have always got along on everything, but knew the Captain was a veteran of the clone wars. Major Tavik respected the m an for his experience. He was immobilized for almost a full minute until he finally shook himself out of it. He turned to his left spying Senior Sergeant Raydon Kent. The Commandant looked squarely at the platoon sergeant, “Sergeant! You are the platoon leader! Get this platoon moving!”

Sergeant Kent considered the Captain a good friend and a valuable asset to Rancor Company. He was deeply saddened by the loss of Captain Karada. He knew he would have to take over as the Platoon Leader. “Yes sir!” Sergeant Kent yelled at the Company Commander.

He charged forward behind the third squad. “Increase your fire! Get these bastards!”

Major Tavik turned to the company frequency to let the other platoon leaders know. “All Ranco elements, this is Major Tavik. It saddens me to tell you all, but Captain Mosh Karada of the 332nd Mobile Assault Infantry Company has perished. Senior Sergeant Raydon Kent has taken over as the First Platoon Commander.” The Commandant paused briefly to allow that to sink in. Then he rekeyed his mic and spoke, “I want a SITREP from each of the platoon commanders.”

Captain Kruger was a very good friend of the Mosh Karada’s. He wanted to weep. He felt the loss the hardest. He slid to the floor beside a vehicle in the Majestic’s bay. He shook terribly. He could feel his eyes welling him, but resisted the urges. Finally, he pulled himself together and regained his footing. “Felidron! Increase the fire! That means you took, Lieutenant!” He was angry and wanted to kill everyone on this ship for the loss of his friend. The Sapper Platoon Commander, Percy Lomax had only met Captain Karada in the past few weeks. He had the impression the Captain was a knowledgeable officer and he held true respect for the man. He knew this would be a terrible loss to eh first platoon if not the company as a whole.

His radio crackled, he froze. The message came, and he went numb, having taken a good while to grasp the words. He felt now something else, something of fire. An infernal rage, bubbling up, boiling within him. He knew not the Captain well, but felt his presence, knew his authority, his compassion for his troops and comrades, his value to the unit. He saw the face now, the grizzled veteran of the Clone Wars of which Trad had been sure would bring victory to Rancor Company. But, he dared not dwell on it, for there was a job to be done.

"This is Second Platoon. Moving sternwards, continuing to clear bunkrooms. Making dead schedule according to available instruments. Two casualties. One wounded, one fatality, both Troopers.

He threw knifehands left and right, and men followed, the fallen from their last skirmish already stabilized and prepared to be picked up by litter teams. The rage continued to fester within him as his boots clattered, making way down the hall. They made exceptional time, clearing the now mostly empty rooms that became less frequent as they move down the corridor, and it split into an intersection, all locked down by blast doors. The sappers prepared the remainder of their charges to blast clear towards the stern, and they were set. Another door clattered after a deafening roar, and the Rebels poured through. Met they were by fortifications, manned by a hastily rallied mercenary squad, well entrenched with what looked to be sturdy cafeteria tables.

The first and second sections took what cover was afforded, while the other sections lay in wait, protection the rear echelon. Shots flew between both forces, and the first men to fall were that of Trad's platoon, and two more met their end at the hands of random chance. Trad took arms, drew his bayonet and nodded to the section leaders, which muttered an order to the huddled troops which followed suit. Soon, both sections were armed with weaponry which mounted matte black longknives, affixed to the muzzle of each. And a dull deep sounded from the first section. Two thermal detonators flew forth, and detonated in a deafening cacophony and blinding flash.

Those men of Trad's platoon, they did not simply yell. No, they roared an infernal roar, one which would pierce the morale of the hardiest. And they charged the enemy, of which were battered and confused by the blasts. Only one of Trad's men were injured in the struggle, however the mercenaries fared worse. Three of the seven were fell with fatal stabs. Another cried mercy as he lay there injured, and was spared. The rest surrendered summarily, and were herded by the overwhelming force and carted off, under the escort of a man from the third section. Aforementioned third section moved in, as did the fourth, the sapper section. They saw once more another blast door, and Trad sighed, beads of sweat dripping from his brow as he and his men prepared to go once more unto the breach.