Malice glanced at his chronometer and pointed up into the sky.
The Alliance Fleet had just left hyperspace and was ready to commence their attack on the Death Star.
The clearing was now crowded with 501st troops supported by several Scout walkers.
Solo, the Princess, the Wookie and their team had been captured and were now surrounded by the Imps. This didn’t look good, but apparently the Imps were under orders not to kill them on sight.
All of a sudden, some of the troopers ran off to capture two droids which had been hiding in the forest, then strange horns sounded and a hail of primitive arrows rained down on the surprised Imps.
Cap didn’t wait to decide whether the missiles were hitting anything or not. If nothing else, they were a diversion.
“Let’s go!” he rasped.
Sarlacc Squad was going in.
Their target was not the main or the back door of the Beta-Type bunker, but the emergency escape hatch which allowed the bunker crew to exit the bunker through an underground tunnel if the bunker commander ordered evacuation of the strongpoint.
Way up in Space a battle was on and there was no time to be wasted.
Malice, Bannen and Ander had formed a defensive perimeter around Rihann as she doctored the escape hatch.
On the far side of the clearing a savage battle was being fought. The furry beings had drawn most of the Imps away into the forest and Solo and the Princess were frantically trying to open the blast door of the bunker. The sounds of war were echoing from the woods, re-echoed from the ridges.
“Do it, girl!” Malice growled.
“Can’t rush an artist, old man…” Rihann muttered.
The control panel showed a series of blinking lights.
As she bent down to rip open the hatch, a blaster bolt missed her head by a handwidth.
“Enemy at nine!” Bannen shouted and sent a series of shots at one of those Imperial troopers in camouflaged armor who had slotted the Alliance commando a while ago.
One of his shots hit the trooper square in the chest, but the charge didn’t penetrate. These guys were equipped with some great quality gear.
Cap drew the stock of his blaster rifle rightly into his shoulder and switched the fire selector to burst fire. In quick succession, sounding almost like a single shot, three shots left his weapon and punched right through the chest armor plating of the Imp.
His death howl confirmed Cap’s clean hit.
At once his comrades dropped back into cover and laid down a barrage of blaster fire.
Malice shouted his tactical orders: “Swing left!”
Garvin Ander increased the power on the repulsor of his heavy rotating blaster which allowed him to wield it like a sporting pistol. The small cannon spit blaster bolts and covered the movement of Bannen and Rihann who ducked and flanked the enemy.
Now they could pour it into them from two sides.
Rihann called out: “Changing clips!” and ejected the empty clip from her weapon.
As she reached for a fresh charger one of the camouflaged Imps rose right in front of her and smashed her weapon away. His right arm was raised over her head, the ejected vibroblade was humming with high intensity.
Without thinking. Rihann let go of her blaster rifle, dropped the charger and went for her pistol.
The weapon cleared the holster. Rihann dropped to the rear to create a bit more distance between her and the Imp and while falling let go a series of shots which caught the Imp in the neck seal. The rounds severed his head from the body, the helmet hit the forest soil with a dull thud. Blood spraying from the uncauterized wound, his armoured body stood upright, then fell forward in apparent slow-motion.
Rihann rolled aside not to be buried under the weight of the dead Imp.
When she was back in a fighting crouch, Bannen was kicking the lifeless body of one Imp to make sure he was dead.
The trooper had lost his camouflage painted helmet during the firefight.
Bannen looked at the corpse. He was young and had severely short-cut blonde hair. If it hadn’t been for the battle scars on his face, he could have played in one of those Holoseries which the Imperial Holonet was broadcasting every day.
Ander gave the others a thumbs-up after he had checked out the fourth corpse. It had taken just a quick glance to confirm his death since his minigun had practically shredded the Imp and thrown him over several times.
Rihann ripped open the hatch.
Malice shouted: “RV Theta in zero four hours!” as he rolled himself into the tunnel.
He pulled the vision enhancement goggles over his eyes and followed the tunnel.
Behind him Ander and Bannen formed the wings of their formation, Rihann providing rear security. There would be no nasty surprise from some Imp who thought he could catch them unaware.
A blaster bolt raced past Cap’s right ear and destroyed a combined motion tracker and stun gun. Another blaster bolt shattered the mirroring device.
The squad did not even slow down.
They were moving in a well-rehearsed deadly ballet with defined fields of fire and responsibilities.
An intersection came up. Cap pressed himself against the metal wall. There was no time for techno gimmicks like Rihann’s insect camera so it came down to old school soldiering. He took a small piece of polished metal out of his pocket which allowed him to scout out what was waiting behind the intersection.
In good Imperial fashion there was a chokepoint manned by three Stormtroopers. In the dim light of the corridor their polished white armor looked a matt grey.
Cap motioned Bannen to take them out with a thermal detonator.
Bannen pulled the grenade from his harness and armed it. He hurled it across the corridor so that it bounced off the far wall and sailed over the barricade.
The grenade detonated with a deafening roar sending shrapnel, pieces of white armor, bones, flesh and blood all over the chokepoint.
Sarlacc Squad charged into this chaos adding blaster fire to complete the carnage and take out any possible Imperial resistance.
“That’s the entry to the control room!” Ander pointed out.
Quv Bannen pressed some det tape to the armoured door while his squadmates stacked up next to the door. He signalled the countdown, then a murderous yet finely tuned explosion ripped the blast door out of its frame.
They dashed on.
To their right, Solo, the Wookie and several of their strike team entered the control center while some Imps, obviously shocked and shaken by the explosion and the unexpected disappearance of the blast door, stood stunned at their consoles.
Bannen pushed a black-clad Imperial officer aside and planted his demo bag on the main control console.
Malice and Ander began herding the Imps towards Solo’s team to get them out of their way.
Solo turned towards Rihann: “Throw me another charge!”
She lobbed a sticky charge at him. Solo blinked irritatedly when he realized that Rihann was not part of his team and neither were the three other commandos.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“That’s classified General!” she replied.
Cap Malice whistled on his fingers. “Shift it!” and started for the rear bunker exit which stood wide open.
As they ran out, Bannen activated the remote detonator and shouted: “Big bang in ten, nine, eight…”
Behind them they heard Solo frantically crying: “Move! Move!”
They had barely reached the treeline when a series of explosions destroyed the bunker. The deflector shield of the Death Star collapsed.
Sarlacc Squad headed for RV Theta.
Rihann sent a quick burst transmission to General Madine: "Mission accomplished. Waiting for Dustoff."
Crix Madine leaned back in his command chair as the burst message showed up on his commlink.
Redundancy, he thought, the duplication of critical components of a system with the intention of increasing reliability of the system, usually in the case of a backup or fail-safe.
And, in his experience, backup never hurts.
