FL/CM Werdna Elbee/Beth 2-1/Wing III/SSSD Sovereign

CM Werdna Elbee was walking down a corridor to the briefing room at a rather fast pace. His briefing had started two minutes ago and he had slept in. He could already hear the ticking off that he would get off his Squadron Commander; "Late again…bad example…you’re a flight leader damn it…do you want your recent promotion to commander taken back…blah blah blah."

Werdna got to the room and tried to sneak into the room as the doors slid open. Luckily it was dark, so when the doors slid back behind him he crept into one of the seats closest to the door.

"…when we get to the platform we will then wait for the ATR to dock before escorting it back to Sovereign" explained Major Raith Sienar, "We don’t expect much bother, but still, be on your guard until the mission is over. Remember that the bacta must complete its journey PLT Destrier at any cost. The Infiltrator Wing had quite a few injuries in their last escapade and have used most of their bacta supply up. Oh, and for the Emperor’s sake, if you see a rebel ship, wait for sensor confirmation before opening fire. It’s probably just a IW patrol."

The lights in the briefing room lit up slightly. Werdna looked around the room and among the familiar faces of the squadron he could also see the excited faces of fresh-faced cadets. "Major, why are there cadets in here?"

"I explained that at the start of the briefing. You should have attended at the right time and you would have found out." The rest of the squadron started giggling but tried to stop as Werdna turned around to see who was laughing. Raith continued, "Pilots dismissed, but can the flight leaders say behind for a moment."

The pilots started shuffling towards the door. LCM Sequoh Marden patted Werdna on the back and said, "Good luck, I hope Raith isn’t too hard on you" before continuing on to the door with the others.

When the briefing room door closed CPT Hunter asked, "What do you what us for?" Raith pondered about what to say for a moment before answering. "It’s about the transports, they’re not carrying bacta, they’re carrying a new type of warhead that has just been developed. They are to be taken to the platform for testing before being put into service. The Rebels would love to get their hands upon them, which is why our squadron is escorting them rather than a proper escort squadron. The transport would look less suspicious to spies if they send out any old squadron instead of a squadron that are experts at this sort of mission. And that’s also whey everyone thinks we’re escorting bacta, even our pilots."

"Clever! Is that why we’ve been given babysitting duty with the cadets?" said Werdna.

"No. We have them because of a shortage of pilots in the fleet. We may need a full squadron for this mission" explained Raith, "anyway your flight is full, it’s me and Hunter that have to keep an eye on the rookies. It’s a good job too; you would probably unteach everything that they’ve learnt in training. I don’t want any more tardiness from you Werdna. Now get to your fighters, we’re heading off soon. Dismissed."

**********

The other pilots were already in the hanger. The veterans of the squadron were telling horror stories about their past missions and how they scraped out of them. Hunter could see the cadet’s faces going pale at the thought of going through a mission themselves, "Stop scaring the poor kids…it’ll spoil the surprise of finding out how bad it actually is."

"Yeah, Hunter’s right. You have get in your fighters now anyway, Raith with be here soon," said Werdna, "and he’s not like me. He will be on time."

Everyone went to their ship. They were all flying TIE Advanced, a step below their usual T/D’s and Missile Boats, but they didn’t want to look too powerful. Werdna got into the TIE, strapped himself in and put on his helmet. Just ahead he could see MAJ Raith doing the same. A moment later a "Is everyone ready?" piped up on the radio. The radio then had a chorus of "Ready" from all of the pilots replying to Raith.

"OK, everyone. Let’s go!"

**********

The squadron flew out of the SSSD Sovereign and made three arrow formations flying side by side. The ATR was already out and the group flew towards it. Together, they headed for the for the Karana system via. hyperspace.

The stars stretched back until all that could be seen as a spiral of blue and white. "Remember, this jump should take 10 minutes to get to our first point where we will rendezvous with the ISD Challenge. We will report in and then be on our way for another 5 minutes to get to PLT Destrier." Raith said, "For now we can just sit back and relax."

"How can you relax in a TIE Advanced?" LT Var Zoraan asked, "I much prefer my Defender. You can just about move your arms in that."

"Well then, Cadets, how are you enjoying it so far?" Asked LT Neo Tarrick, "I’ve not been flying long myself and I loved my first flight in one of these babies."

"It’s amazing, sir." Said one cadet, "I just hope to do this again sometime."

"Ha, let’s get this mission over with first, kid" LT Roy Brown laughed.

The radio went quite for a moment before LT Mazen asked, "Did you get in any bother about the briefing, Werdna?"

"Not yet!" Raith joked, "but I’ll have him doing janitor work by this evening."

"Oh, wonderful! I can’t wait to do that!"

"Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit, Commander."

"I thought it was slapstick."

And on it went…

**********

"One minute until realspace!"

Werdna sat up in his seat and tried to wake himself up a bit by shaking his head. He attempted to put his fingers over all of the important control buttons and wrapped his other hand around the control stick. There shouldn’t be any bother when they hit realspace, but you never know, there could be a whole rebel fleet at their rendezvous point.

The clock was still ticking away and there was only 30 seconds to go. Werdna watched it winding down to zero slowly and when it reached 20 seconds the winding blue spiral outside of the ship started to slow down. It was at 10 seconds that the spiral disappeared completely and there was nothing but stretching white stars flying past him.

"We should hit realspace…NOW!" The space outside turned back to the normal of realspace and it took a second for Werdna to realise where he was. At about six kilometres the ISD Challenge could be seen, but it wasn’t alone. There were over a hundred Rebel starfighters buzzing around the Challenge and about half that number of TIE Fighters taking them on.

"Shouldn’t we go and help them?" a cadet asked, "They look outnumbered."

"No, they can handle it and we have a mission to complete. Just make sure that none of the rebels get to the transport. I don’t even want it sensored, never mind destroyed." Raith demanded, "I’m going to radio in before we jump again. Head to the next hyperspace buoy."

"A group of Y-Wings have broken off the Challenge and are heading our way," warned Sequoh.

"Flight Two, take them out. Flights One and Two, cover the ATR until we hit hyperspace. I’ll report in right now so we can be on our way as soon as possible." Raith ordered, "ISD Challenge, this is Beth Squadron. Everything is going fine for us and we request that we be on our way to the PLT Destrier as soon as possible"

A voice came over the radio, "You are >kzzz< okay to continue your mission >kzzz<, I suggest that you go now an avoid the traffic."

"Thank you Challenge, and good luck!"

**********

"Let’s do this quickly, people. Break their formation and try to get them to back away from the transport." Werdna requested, "Then pick a target and sort them out."

Both formations were on a head on collision and when they got two kilometres apart the lasers started flying. All of the ships then broke formation and started dodging each other’s fire. The ships began to dance around each other trying to get the better of their opposing craft.

LT Mazen had no problem picking off his first Rebel. He headed at the Y-Wing and just before collision he corkscrewed around the Rebel. Of course, a TIE Advanced is much more maneuverable than a Y-Wing, so he turned around and opened fire before the rebel even knew what had happened.

Var Zoraan didn’t have it so easy and seemed to take on the best pilot out of the Rebels. The Y-Wing was on his tail and Zoraan had to weave through the fire that was behind him. Zoraan suddenly brought his TIE to a halt and the Y-Wing flew past him, allowing Zoraan to send the Rebel to "meet his creator."

A hit was taken on the side of Zoraan’s fighter before he was able to get on the move again. The sensor showed the new Y-Wing closing in for an easy kill, but it disintegrated before it had the chance. Sequoh Marden had just got his first kill for the day.

Werdna was still hot on the heels of his opponent, trying to make sure that he did not bump into the back of the slow Y-Wing. The Y-Wing slowed down even more and Werdna had to react fast to avoid collision. The TIE Advanced swooped around for another shot, but the Y-Wing had gained some ground. Werdna stuck his fighter onto full throttle and use one more blast of quad lasers to destroy the rebel scum.

There were now only two Y-Wings left and they were heading for the transport. "Mazen! Zoraan! Go after the Y-Wings and Sequoh and I will head them off before they reach the ATR."

Zoraan took down one of the Rebels with only a few accurate shots but Mazen had more trouble. The remaining Y-Wing was frustratingly good at avoiding incoming fire and continued closing in on the transport. Zoraan soon swooped into help but the rebel still had the better of them by avoiding each shot. Werdna and Sequoh had got in front of the enemy fighter and swung around at the Y-Wing. The Rebel could not handle this and soon took the needed amount of hits to be blasted apart.

"Good work, Flight Two. Now rejoin us before be get to the hyperspace buoy." Raith ordered over the radio. They took their position in the squadrons formation and then shot off on another jump.

**********

"I wish I got the chance to fight," moaned a cadet.

"Yeah, you could have had mine," replied Sequoh, "He was an easy kill, especially with Var as bait."

"I had to slow down my TIE. It was the only way that I could take out the Rebel scum that was behind me," explained Var Zoraan, "Anyway, my second kill was the easiest. I never missed a shot with that one."

"Yes, Bravo," Hunter dryly said, "I almost had to bail you out when the last Y-Wing was getting away from you."

"Alright, quite everyone. We’ll be at the platform in a minute. Get ready!" Raith informed.

Werdna’s hand was killing him. It always hurt a bit after a dogfight. It’s probably just a lack of exercise, he thought, I’ll try some of them Jedi training techniques to get my fitness up when I get back.

The group shot back into realspace and continued on to the platform to make sure that the ATR got into the hanger.

A voice popped up on the radio, "Thank You, Beth Squadron! Now that your mission is over would you like to stop for a rest on the platform?"

"No thanks! We have to be heading back. We have a party to attend." Raith replied.

"What party is this?" Neo Tarrick asked.

"Since we are passing on our way back to the Sovereign I thought that it would be a good idea to see if the Challenge needed any more help."

"Sounds like fun! Count me in," said Brown.

"If they’ll have us, I’ll gladly attend," added Mazen.

"I’m certainly not going to be late for this!"

FL/CM Werdna Elbee/Beth 2-1/Wing III/SSSD Sovereign

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