[The Hawkbat]

A slight air of nervousness hung over the command centre of Viscos' base.

The pirate in charge of the base defenses was starting to feel rather concerned. His leader had been gone for a long time now. He'd claimed he was just taking the twi'lek girl on a little trip, but then why was he taking so long? Surely he'd have given them more information if he'd planned to be away this long.

Suddenly an alarm rang at one of the command centre's terminals, and a new sensor contact appeared. Striding quickly to the terminal, the unsuspecting pirate felt a sense of relief and excitement.

That's probably him... he thought. Finally...

The pirate's expression turned to one of shock when he realised that the vessel the sensors were picking up was not a yacht, but an HWK 290 flying straight for the base at full speed.

"Red alert!" he yelled to one of his subordinates, but it was too late. Swooping into one of the base's hangar bays like a predator swooping down on it's prey, a dull red HWK 290 courier touched down in the middle of the room, much to the surprise of the pirates who were there at the time. Staring at the ship in shock, they were easy prey for the group of Mandalorians that suddenly burst out of the vessel, blasters firing. A couple of them managed to recover fast enough to run for cover, but they didn't last long. Within thirty seconds the bay belonged to the intruders.

Rising from the Hawkbat's pilots seat, Rasha drew Viscos' blaster and quickly disembarked. She found herself feeling rather impressed by how quickly the strike team had secured the hangar, but she didn't dwell on those feelings for long.

"Okay everyone, move out!" the twi'lek ordered as she strode towards the hangar door. They had a set of objectives to capture, and only a very limited amount of time in which to capture them...

Kayen followed her quickly and shut his helmet visor as he did. He quickly drew his Westar-34s from his thighs and fired expertly at a few of the remaining pirate stragglers, dropping them quickly and efficiently. He then stepped up near Rasha, his eyes dancing about cautiously.

"You take point?"

Rasha smirked.

"Ladies first, huh?"

Stepping forward, the twi'lek took the point position as they started down a corridor, blasters at the ready. By this point, the pirates were well aware of their presence, as an intruder alert had been issued over the base intercom.

A short ways in front of the pair, a pirate armed with a blaster carbine suddenly appeared. Responding quickly to the threat, Rasha fired three shots in rapid succession, one of which missed, but the other two of which struck home -hardly an unusual sort of outcome for her, given that her style of gunslinging emphasized a quick draw speed and volume of fire over pinpoint accuracy in close range engagements. She felt a touch of satisfaction with her results -it was the first time she'd gotten a chance to fire the Model 434 she'd got off Viscos, but it seemed that the gun pointed quite well, even if its handling was a bit heavy compared to some lighter blasters.

Kayen didn't even get a chance to fire at the pirate before Rasha took him down and Kayen chuckled slightly.

"Not bad..."

He added as he walked forward with her and looked around a corner. A pair of pirates with blaster rifles opened fire and Kayen dropped to one knee, firing both of his Westar-34s and hitting both pirates. One of the pirates fell to his back dead and the other was still alive, weakly. Kayen stepped up to him and shot him in the forehead.

Rasha frowned, though not in response to the way Kayen finished off the wounded pirate.

This is too easy, the twi'lek though to herself. She did not voice her opinion, as she did not want to tempt fate, but she couldn't help but feel that things were going a little too well. Given the number of pirates who lived on the base, she had expected her tiny strike force might face some heavy resistance...

If fate responded to temptation, it apparently responded just as well to thoughts as it did to words, because within moments of Rasha thinking that the resistance she was facing was too light, it quite abruptly got a lot heavier as the doors to a gathering place up ahead -perhaps a mess hall or lounge area- opened up and large group of pirates poured out, blasters in hand. Rasha fired a few shots at the mob, but quickly realised that there were way too many of them for her to safely deal with out in the open the way she was even with Kayen's support. Running up to the nearest set of set of blast doors, the twi'lek pulled the release and ducked inside, firing on the one pirate she saw as she did so. Quickly turning her attention back to the group outside, she hugged the wall, leaned out, and squeezed off a volley of shots at the nearest enemy, hitting him at least twice. She was about to shift attention to another pirate when someone grabbed hold of her from behind and put a vibroblade to her throat.

"Drop the gun," a voice ordered. Apparently, her cursory examination of the room she had ducked into had been a little too cursory.

Kayen had ran backwards away from the group of incoming pirates and into the second door opposite Rasha on the edge of the doorframe. He fired a few times around the corner until the pirate grabbed Rasha.

He must have completely not seen Kayen, because his back was to him. Kayen quickly leveled his blaster with the head of the pirate and fired through his skull, killing him and nearly burning Rasha in the process but he had saved her pretty face.

"Drop the blade or you're dead too... oops too late!" Kayen grinned as he glanced at the twi'lek.

"Are you hurt?"

Rasha felt the pirate who had put the vibroblade to her throat go limp, and shook him off, turning slightly and grimacing as she did so.

"Owe you one!" she called back to Kayen before quickly turning back to the group in front of them and firing off a volley of shots as two of the pirates closed in on her position. They went down quite easily, but some of their companions were starting towards cover of their own, which would make things more difficult. At least there weren't as many now as there were earlier.

Kayen moved to her side quickly again and started to take turns firing into the pirates with her. He glanced over to Rasha and smiled briefly before firing around the corner again. "You're not a bad shot for such a beautiful girl!"

Kayen growled as a few pirates got a little closer. He glanced around before he yelled "cover me!"

He didn't even give Rasha time to respond before he ran forward right into the group of shocked pirates, firing wildly. Most of them went down quickly because of the sheer suicidal nature of what Kayen had done. One of the pirates got a lucky shot on Kayen's shoulder, blackening his armor as Kayen quickly shot him in the face. "I'll repaint that with your blood!"

Most of the remaining pirates in the group started to separate, a few of them fleeing right toward Rasha.

Rasha might have glared at Kayen for his comment, but was too busy exchanging fire with the pirates up the corridor. A few moments later, she found herself staring in disbelief as the Mandalorian charged towards the enemy. Nevertheless, she began laying down the requested covering fire, though she found it somewhat difficult with Kayen's moving form taking up so much of the corridor. Somehow, the Mandalorian managed to route the pirate group, although then again, he did have that armour.

Rasha took out the remaining enemies as they ran down the corridor towards her, then reached into one of the pockets of her gunbelt and began to switch out the nearly depleted power cell on her blaster.

"Nice work, but I hope you weren't trying to impress me with that stunt," she called up the corridor to Kayen. It seemed she wasn't entirely happy with the risks he had taken.

Kayen smiled back to her and shrugged helplessly. He walked over to her and kept his eyes opened for any approaching dangers but she could see that he was standing uncomfortably and if she looked at his shoulder she could see that some of the blast had gone through the armor but he seemed to be handling it easily. "Where to next? We're not far from the control room..."

"Yeah. We better get in there. The Firespray pilots aren't going to be happy with us if they have to worry about both pirate ships and the base defenses."

The twi'lek found herself hoping that the rest of the Mandalorians were doing better then she and Kayen were. They were running out of time, and Kayen seemed to have been wounded, though not very badly.

Without another word, Rasha brushed past Kayen and began leading the way towards the suspected location of the command centre, which was only a short distance away. It was as she approached that a clanking sound reached her ears.

What is that? she wondered. She got her answer a few moments later as a round metallic object rolled into view and suddenly reared up like some kind of scorpion. She stared at the machine in shock.

A droideka?! Where the heck did a pirate group get a droideka?

It had probably been a cargo on one of the captured smuggling ships. Such machines fetched a pretty penny on the black market.

Diving to the side, Rasha hid behind one of the passageway's structural arches as a volley of blaster cannon fire ripped by her. What was she supposed to do about something like that? She doubted Kayen had the firewpower to penetrate a Droideka's forcefield, and she knew that she definitely didn't....

Kayen quickly ducked behind the edge of the wall, looking over to Rasha "Where the hell did that come from???" he asked as he fired twice into the shield of the droid, but it did very little. He blinked and quickly changed out his own power packs of his Westars. "That shield doesn't stretch very well! Fire from multiple places might overload it..."

Rasha gritted her teeth.

"Yeah, but not if the only things that are hitting it are hand blasters. I don't suppose you've got any specialty rounds for that rifle of yours? Energy shells or something like that?"

She hoped he did. If he didn't, or if he didn't have enough, she was going to have to run back up the corridor and grab that heavy blaster rifle one of the pirates they had fought earlier had been carrying. She'd passed on it when she'd had the chance, due to the fact that it was so large and clumsy for close quarters work, but she was beginning to regret her decision. It would have been very useful to have right now.

OOC: For any mods who are worred: if Rasha does have to use that blaster rifle, she probably won't be keeping it long -I'll just have her use it to deal with the Droideka.

Kayen shook his head quickly and knelt down slightly against the wall "sorry I don't!"

"Great."

The twi'lek leaned out and fired off a quick blast.

"Think you could distract this thing for me?"

"Sure I'll just dance for it!"

Kayen said sarcastically before he peeked out and started to fire repeatedly at the droid.

"GO!!!"

Rasha bolted down the corridor -but not towards the Droideka. Instead she bolted away from it.

"I'll be back in a minute!" she yelled, hoping that Kayen would believe her. If he didn't play his part in this, then she was in big trouble.

Finally deciding that it had had enough of being shot at from behind cover, the Droideka turned it's guns on the arch that Rasha and Kayen had been using and cover and rapidly began to blast its way through it.

Kayen looked at the arch and back towards Rasha hoping she had not abandoned him. He growled as the arch started to melt and Kayen knew it wouldn't hold for long. He quickly darted sideways into the open and ran towards the droideka, barely avoiding being blasted. Kayen quickly got up to a second doorway and ducked inside, firing back out to keep the droid distracted.

Skidding to a halt near the group of pirates they'd dealt with earlier, Rasha stooped down and took hold of the heavy blaster rifle one of them had been carrying. The weapon was big and cumbersome, but it also had far greater firepower then a blaster pistol, and that was what she needed at that moment. Sprinting a short distance up the corridor, the twi'lek took cover and a aimed the weapon at the droideka -a relatively easy task given that the rifle was designed for ranges far greater then the one she was currently dealing with. Switching the fire selector to burst mode, the twi'lek yanked the trigger repeatedly, sending volley after volley after blaster bolts down the corridor towards the Droideka. She hoped the blaster rifle could overwhelm the machine's shields quickly -it was shifting its attention back to her, and it was only a matter of time before it began to return her fire.

Kayen came from the back of the droid with both of his blasters firing. The shield started to fluctuate and the droid was about to fire on Rasha when the shields finally failed and the droid was fired into until it dropped in a heap of hot steel. Kayen looked up to the twi'lek and grinned "Something about a Twi'lek with a heavy blaster... hot! Now let's get to the control room! We're running behind..."

Rasha let the heavy blaster rifle drop to the floor, it's power cell nearly depleted. She considered keeping it, but it would require a cell change before it could successfully take on another droideka if any more showed up, and it was also a little on the large side for entry work.

Running back up the corridor, Rasha took position next to the blast doors that they suspected led to the command centre, her blaster pistol back in hand.

"You mind taking point for this?" she asked Kayen. "They probably know we're coming, so your armour may come in handy."

Rasha generally wasn't into weighing oneself down with a lot of armour plating, but she had to admit, it made sense when one wanted to forcibly enter an enemy occupied room.

Kayen nodded to Rasha as he stepped up to the door and he lowered one of his Westar-34s back to its holster and replaced it with his DL-44 and then he shot the lock of the door and it opened. Kayen went in firing as a few shots grazed his armor.

Rasha followed Kayen in and began shooting, using the Mandalorian as cover as she did so. She was more careful about policing her fire in the control centre, as a stray shot could potentially damage important equipment. This meant that well controlled shots were her order of business here as opposed to the rapid fire volleys she typically favored in close quarters. Thankfully there weren't many targets for her and Kayen to engage, so the lack of massed fire from her wasn't as big a proble as it could have been. Even so however she had a close call with an enemy blaster bolt before the two of them managed to secure the room.

Walking quickly over to the control consoles for the base defenses, Rasha began to study them, noting the various laser and ion cannons that formed the seemingly sparse defenses...

Suddenly, her eyes fell upon a particular set of controls, and grin slowly began to spread across her face.

"Well, well, well..." she said with a slight chuckle, "It looks like we're quite lucky today."

Kayen quickly found the control to lock the doors to the control room and he pulled the lock, locking them from any unwanted guests before he walked over to Rasha and looked at the controls that she was looking at curiously.

"What you got there?"

Rasha grinned and pointed at one of the consoles.

"Recognise these?" she asked, referring to the firing controls for a set of concussion missile launchers. She hadn't even realised that bases' defenses incorporated missiles. It was a good thing the pirates hadn't gotten a chance to use them on the Firesprays...

Kayen smirked and slid into the seat of the launchers, nodding quickly to Rasha and then he flipped the targeting system to manual, getting a lock on one of the pirate fighters that was chasing a Firespray. After a few moments, Kayen fired the missiles and clapped his hands. "Damn I'm good!"

Working with a different set of firing controls, Rasha began locking onto some of the other pirate fighters and firing missiles off at them.

Too bad we didn't get here a bit earlier. With this sort of firepower, we could have wiped out most of the returning fighters in one go if we'd been able to target them while they were jumping in.

With the tide of the space battle now in the Mandalorians favour, the twi'lek considered turning her attention to the base's weak compliment of ion cannons and using them to disable the medium freighter that was moored to the base, but since the freighter showed no sign of leaving, she decided to wait a little longer, and was thankful she did, as one of the pirate fighters made an attempt to flee the scene shortly thereafter.

Oh no you don't, she thought to herself as she directed the missile's targetting package to lock onto the fleeing craft. Moments later, she fired a volley of warheads and waited as they closed in on the fighter. The craft looked to be preparing to jump to hyperspace...

The massed volley of missiles detonated, and the pirate fighter was consumed in the powerful explosions. Rasha grinned. That was probably overkill, but it was also immensely satisfying.

Kayen smiled over to Rasha and then he turned in his seat and started to look at the internal sensors of the base, pointing to a group of people who were huddled in one of the hangars as he asked "do we have any people there? We shouldn't..."

Rasha shook her head.

"No we don't. Our strike force is too small to assign that many people to one area, and besides, they aren't dressed like Mandalorians."

She looked at the progress of the space battle outside the base.

"Order the Firesprays to finish of the remaining enemy ships, then proceed to their assigned hangar bays immediately. Once we know which hangar bay those people are in, we'll send someone to clear it out."

The twi'lek switched stations and began to bring the base's weak array of ion cannons to bear on the still moored medium freighter to prevent it's escape.

"Order all the soldiers to check in too. If anyone doesn't, one of us may need to go and secure that hangar."

Kayen looked at Rasha and smirked slowly "I have a better idea..." he said as he ran his fingers over a few buttons and suddenly depressurized the hangar bay and flushed the group into space before he checked in with the rest of the other bounty hunters.

Rasha winced as some of the equipment in the hangar bay shifted position due to the decompression, but had to admit she was impressed by how efficiently it took care of their problem.

"Everyone check in fine?" the twi'lek asked.

Kayen turned and nodded to Rasha before he added "Troop 2 took a bit of fire and one of the Firesprays got hit but it'll be fine. I estimate that 90% of the pirates have been neutralized. All we have left is to take the freighter..."

"That, and use the scanning equipment to sweep every inch of this base for survivors. Plus make a list of the ships and cargo we've recovered to take to Jabba."

The twi'lek leaned back.

"This is where the boring parts are going to start. What do you prefer, joining one of the sweeper teams, or staying here to keep watch over the command centre?"

Kayen smiled over to Rasha and looked over to his shoulder wound before he shrugged over to her. "I don't think I'd be very good with this shoulder. It's starting to hurt like a b*tch now so I'll stay here..."

Rasha nodded. She'd hoped she could get Kayen working with the other Mandalorians to do the sweeping, but that shoulder wound was a problem.

"You should get that checked once we've finished the sweep."

"Yeah I will have to" Kayen nodded as he sat there and waited for her. (sorry I have been back in the hospital)

Rasha nodded to Kayen.

"Good work," she thanked him, then walked out the door to deal with the mopping up that awaited.

[The Hawkbat Returns]

Kayen monitored everything that was going on with multiple sensors on various screens as he sighed to himself. He was in pain, but he had to ignore it until he was safe and out of this hellhole.