SWTFW 06 - "The Mercenary"

A Chapter by dw817

"This is Boba Fett. A bounty hunter and a soldier for hire. He is the best. He is currently outfitted in a rebel's X-Wing fighter craft. He will find the aperture beyond this moon's defenses."

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THE FORCE WITHIN
© April 2017 Written by David Wicker
Please do not reprint without permission

CHAPTER 6 - "THE MERCENARY"
[ CHOOSE A DIFFERENT CHAPTER ]

* * *

This entry is Rated: EVERYONE

Luke leaned back in his seat. He hit a button to make it recline slightly and was more comfortable.

Everything was okay now. The system was set on automatic pilot.

Luke yawned and spoke, "Raise ambient temperature by 10 degrees."

The computer relayed, "Confirmed."

And - Luke slept.

. . .

Back with Vader, the new course for Yavin's moon was set and him and his murderous crew quickly arrived at their destination.

Back on Yavin, an alarm sounded. Jan had decided to sleep on the cot in the main base of operations and jerked up immediately. She looked to the scanners and saw the barrage of Vader's ships.

She smiled confidently. "Engage planetary shields."

A computer voice relayed, "Engaged."

Back in space, Vader was calculating the best approach when he thought he saw something unusual. A slight blue tinge around the planet's surface.

Vader checked the stock of ammo for all the tie-fighters and selected the two that had fired their shots needlessly into the asteroids.

"You, 34 and 36, achieve planetfall."

Without a word they left orbit and descended rapidly to what appeared to be the capital of Yavin, only to be dashed asunder by the powerful forcefield now encircling the planet.

Vader smiled. The other pilots knew he chose those 2-pilots and only them because they had opened fire without his permission. Vader was well-known for sending soldiers he didn't like directly into suicide missions.

Smite broke the silence. "Lord Vader, it appears they have some kind of planetary defense shields. We're awaiting your new orders."

Vader already knew the planet was defended, but there had to be an aperture somewhere around it where rebel ships were being permitted.

"I think it's time to send in our decoy." Vader rumbled to the others.

Smite was confused, "What ? Who ?"

Looking around though, it appeared as if an X-Wing fighter had followed them through warp.

"It's the enemy !" one of the less-trained pilots spoke.

He quickly turned around his tie-fighter craft to engage when suddenly his ship vaporized in a shower of sparks and disintegration.

Vader breathed heavily, "Would anyone else care to engage this 'enemy' ship ?"

All were still and silent around.

Vader explained. "This is Boba Fett. A bounty hunter and a soldier for hire. He is the best. He is currently outfitted in a rebel's X-Wing fighter craft. He will find the aperture beyond this moon's force-field and gain us all admittance. For now, we must retreat into space where the rebel's scanners will not reach."

Smite spoke, "Very well, Vader. Okay all of you. Let's pull back, just to the distance of their scanners. Then we'll let Vader's decoy do his work."

Back on the planet Jan was watching the scanners intensely. It showed Vader's invasion fleet withdraw. She laughed to herself and gazed on further. In another minute they were well out of scanner range.

She was pleased and yawned. She had been going for so many hours without sleep, it was hard to stay awake. She checked security and defenses. Everything was operating at prime efficiency. She yawned one more time, luxuriously, and went back to the cot to sleep till morning.

* * *

Back in space, Vader's crew had pulled well away from scanner range and had just located the aperture to enter the moon, on the opposite side of where they were.

Then Vader hit a switch on his console and spoke, "Boba Fett. Just as we planned."

Boba's raspy voice was heard, "No problems, Lord Vader. I have the keycodes already entered in the ship's computers."

Vader turned off the switch and leaned his heavy bulk back in the all-black chair. He was restless however and started to look at the history and flying skills of each of the crew called for this planetary assault.

Boba wasted no time and quickly went around to the other side of the moon. There was seen the aperture. An opening in the forcefield where X-Wings and other rebel ships were permitted to enter and exit.

Boba approached. At once his radio lit up and he hit a button to connect the intercom.

"X-Wing. We have no record of you at this time. State who you are and your business here."

Boba spoke glibly, "I was part of the assault team on the Death Star and got separated from the others."

There was a moment of silence. "Carbon scoring on your ship indicates you were indeed hit by imperial ships and fire. What is your call sign ?"

Boba leaned in to the receiver closer. "White Shadow." he said, slightly muffled by his helmet.

A grumpy voice returned, "We have no pilots here with the call sign of 'White Shadow.' "

Boba explained quickly, "I had joined from the 15th Battalion when I heard what the target was, the Death Star. I flew in to assist the Rebels in their fight."

The voice sounded relieved, "Oh ! Is that all ? Okay, 'White Shadow' you are clear for entry, and welcome back !"

Boba clicked off his communicator. He carefully approached the aperture and went to his computer. Silently he entered coordinates into his computer for targets to hit for the aperture and its surrounding ships. Unknown to the rebels, Boba's particular X-Wing was loaded down with some of the most destructive firepower known in the galaxy.

Z-Bombs. Illegal to carry let alone be caught with one. They were made of a very dark science indeed relying on the explosive effect of anti-matter in contact with matter. It used the energy released from such a catalytic reaction to invoke a greater explosion of what was simply labeled as "strange matter" energy.

Strange Matter energy was devastating to say the least. While it couldn't cut through a planet's forcefield, it would indeed go through anything else that got in its way, much like a high-powered light-saber but weaponized for use in space combat.

. . .

Luke had fallen asleep. He had forgotten that he earlier increased his oxygen content and was now sleeping blissfully. But it was not good. His own pulse, heart, and brain were slowing down, lured by drowning the body and system in pure ethereal oxygen.

Now had Luke attached life monitors to himself, an alarm would've woken him, but he had not done so. He would die quite peacefully.

But suddenly he collided with something that brought him out of warp. The wake of an unexpected ship. Warp technology was such that while it could navigate whole star systems, there was still no way to determine when warp lines crossed, and in this case, they did.

While there was no direct collision with the other alien ship, their warp lines crossed, forcing a sudden shut down of engines in both ships and sounding alarms besides.

A loud alarm sounded in Luke's ship, but he was too inebriated in oxygen to respond.

The other pilot, a young woman, tried to hail Luke on his radio, but to no effect.

Finally she flew by his cockpit to see what the problem was - and saw him deeply asleep.

Quickly she linked the cockpits together. A safety mechanism appeared to protect the edges of both ships, and now, upside-down, she could reach Luke and see what the problem was.

Weightless, she moved Luke over and checked the condition of his ship.

A red light showing a dangerous mix of enriched oxygen and lacking nitrogen were underway.

She coughed herself, feeling the sick sweetness of pure oxygen and quickly reset them back to normal levels. She then reached to the side and pulled out a medical mask provided by the ship and forced Luke to breathe normal air. All the while she gently slapped him on the side of his face.

Suddenly Luke struggled and was awake and aware of her.

She shook her head and spoke, "God ! What idiot would mess with their atmospheric controls and nearly kill themselves by drowning in oxygen !?"

Luke couldn't speak just yet. He coughed hoarsely trying to clear the impure air from his lungs. She was patient and gave him a moment to compose himself.

Finally she asked, "What's your name, pilot ?"

"Luke."

"What's your call-sign ?"

"I - I don't have one."

"I see. Well my name is Rebecca. Where you headed, Luke ?"

Luke felt like he shouldn't tell her his true destination, which was to rendezvous with Vader. He also shouldn't mention Yavin as likely they were still looking for the missing stolen X-Wing. Instead he replied as casually as he could his own home planet, "Tatooine."

She shook her head, "That's a long ways from here, Luke. Do you feel well enough to fly ?"

Luke struggled to raise up from the side but couldn't.

"Guess not." she said, answering her own question. "I suppose it's up to me."

She hit a switch above her in her upside-down cockpit and the panes receded neatly without ever losing air pressure. Her ship drifted nearby and listless. It was then that Luke noticed it was not a ship he recognized. More birdlike in design than anything the Empire or Rebels had.

Seeing the look of confusion on luke she reassured him. "Don't worry, it'll be fine." Then she picked up the radio and entered in a bunch of unknown coordinates.

A new voice spoke, "Becka, is that you ?"

"Sure is, Matt. Hey, I've got a bit of an emergency here. Can you pick up my Starbird at - " and she relayed the coordinates.

"No problem. I'll head over and tractor beam it back. You got a ride ?"

She nodded, "Yes. I'm heading to Tatooine. I shouldn't be too long. Out."

Luke felt strange, his whole body was tingling but he still couldn't move anything below his neck.

She looked back to see he was at what appeared to be an uncomfortable angle and hadn't moved an inch. "You really did poison yourself well, Luke." she said crisply.

Luke just rotated his head, frustrated the rest of his body was apparently paralyzed. Then Rebecca hooked up the life monitor to him. Several meters showed in the red that Luke's health was indeed in a bad state.

"God you should be glad I found you ! You need to be hospitalized, right now !"

Luke was quiet but nodded.

Rebecca picked Luke up (remember it's zero G in space) and buckled him in the seat behind as X-Wings were standard with two seats, one behind the other.

"Next stop, Tatooine." she told Luke with a bit of a smile, and locked herself into the pilot's seat. She set some coordinates for the destination, and they were no their way.

. . .

Back with Boba Fett, he was just about to send his salvo of unexpected Z-Bomb when the radio suddenly chirped for attention.

Boba picked it up. A voice spoke, a little angrily this time, "You coming in or what, White Shadow ?"

Boba smirked but replied nicely, "Just a moment. I was working on something. Okay, I'm heading in now."

He clicked off the radio. Checked his targets. All were perfectly aligned. He gave an evil smirk, hidden by his helmet, and hit the FIRING button.

(to be continued)

END OF CHAPTER 6