Part One: Savannah Logan

The woman in the dark blue leather armor with red trim launched herself into a diving roll across the intersection on a narrow street. The Blastech pistols in each hand spat ruby shards of energy for a brief moment before she tumbled behind the building across the intersection. She heard a squeal of pain and smiled in satisfaction.
But it was a no-win situation. There were too many of them and not enough of her. Eventually they would have her boxed in.
Savannah Logan tapped the corner of the blue-lensed, round framed shades. Heat patterns immediately projected on the inside surface of the lenses. There were still three of them left standing down the street. Three Weequays cautiously approaching her hiding spot. The local citizenry had already cleared out the moment the shooting started.
Dust swirled on gusts of wind in the dry climate of Tattooine, building up against the sandstone buildings of Mos Eisley. And an army of mercenaries--like herself--and bounty hunters stalked her amongst the crooked narrow streets of the squalid startown.
"I suppose I didn't really need to piss off Krilla the Hutt," she muttered to herself, hunkering down between two garbage bins behind a cantina.
One thing was certain. They didn't know where her ship was and so couldn't wait to bushwhack when she went to it--Something she needed to do to escape the clutches of the Hutt Triumverate.
The death of Jabba the Hutt at the hands of Princess Leia, now a New Republic Leader, had left a power vacuum on the Hutt controlled planet of Tattooine and the surrounding systems of the Outer Rim Territories. Jabba's empire had been vast, with tendrils even reaching into the now defunct Palpatine Empire itself.
The collapse of the Palpatine Regime had provided an unprecedented opportunity for the Hutts to exploit the situation. As pocket empires sprung up all over the galaxy, the Hutts were able to supply various goods and commodities to a vast number of factions, acting as go-betweens and suppliers.
The Hutts weren't particularly mindful of who they supplied to either, often supplying goods and weapons to opposing sides. They helped small fleets of Imperial warships that still roamed the galaxy. They supplied the Rebel Alliance, though it was known they also supplied the remnants of the Empire. Necessity made doing business with the Hutts imperative until the fledgling Alliance could generate enough of an industrial base to be truly self-sufficient. That meant having to put up with the Hutts' various illegal and nefarious activities, including smuggling, extortion, pirate raids, and any number of other activities designed to line the Hutts' coffers at the expense of others.
And Jabba had been the strongest of them all, but there were others nearly as strong.
One of these was a triad of Hutts who were pooling their resources to overthrow Jabba until his untimely death made it no longer necessary. Instead, they moved into the vacuum left by Jabba and claimed his operations long before anyone was even aware that Jabba was dead.
In very short order they had expanded his operation into a veritable economic empire that came close to rivaling the New Empire in resources, though much of it was by proxy through a number of corporations that could not be traced back to them.
This Triumvirate included Sulla, the leader of the faction, iron-willed and ruthless; Krilla, a female Hutt whose cruelty knew no bounds; and Chavva, whose main forte was information gathering-spying. He had a vast network of Eyes and Ears that rivaled that of the Bothans-even included some of that network.
It was because of Chavva that the Hutts became aware of the new SSSD Sovereign class of starship, the first of which had recently rolled off the assembly line and was now in service. Technology any number of the Triad's clients would pay a fortune for obtaining, including the New Alliance.
However, this new ship needed to be supplied as well, in goods and services not yet available to the Emperor's Hammer, the new Empire, which would eventually bring them to the Hutts, though perhaps not directly...
Savannah had gathered information here and there during her employ with the various merchant factions as an escort pilot--which had been more lucrative of late than bounty hunting--her chief occupation.
That information concerned a former Black Sun employee who had been responsible for the destruction of a branch of that organization on Narr Shaddaa. Her Brother, Fenn Logan. She had not seen him since the day they parted in the slums of Vertical City, after he had saved her from the clutches of Bayless. He had wanted to join the New Empire and she was still paranoid of large governments and wanted to pursue her own path.
But now she needed to warn him, and in the process, the New Empire. Not that she had an opinion either way about the New Order. She just did not want to see anything bad happen to her brother.
I wonder if they will try to reclaim my ship as Imperial property, she thought.
Her ship, Savannah's Revenge, was a rebuilt TIE Interceptor scavanged from the graveyard of Endor's Moon. One of the experimental refits to combat the shielded Rebel fighters, it had a hyperdrive, shields, and a beam weapon--a tractor beam that she mainly used for additional systems power. She had obtained the parts to rebuild the Imperial craft in great secrecy, using her contacts in the Bounty Hunters' Guild. It had also been modified to carry a double load of missiles. Savannah's Revenge may have been somewhat fragile, but with the shields and its maneuverability, Savannah was not to be taken lightly when in the cockpit--as was expressed by her employers with the generous bonuses she and her partner, Joanna Rake and the CORT Xunrunner, received for escort runs. 
Now it was a question of whether or not she could make her escape to reach it, and ultimately the Xunrunner waiting just outside local Tattooine space.
As if to mock her for thinking such a thing, a soft scuffle sounded near the corner of the building on the other side of the dumpster. Savannah could see her pursuers' heat patterns, determining one of them was trying to sneak up on her position. She counted to 3 under her breath, then planted both feet against the dumpster and kicked out.
Savannah was satisfied by the dull thump and a resultant grunt of pain. She immediately rolled back to her feet and dove from her hiding spot, the Blastech pistols spitting amber bolts in alternate shots. Several of them hit a bounty hunter, spinning him in his tracks, tendrils of smoke curling from the cauterized wounds in chest and body. He collapsed with a sigh, his stormtrooper rifle clattering to the dusty street.
Savannah hit the ground in the middle of the intersection on her stomach, landing with a grunt. More energy bolts sizzled towards her in a flurry as she scrambled for cover behind the opposite building. Something slapped her shoulder hard enough to spin her, and she tumbled awkwardly out of sight, gasping in pain, managing to hold on to her guns through sheer willpower.
"Okay, this is getting a bit much," she muttered, glancing at her shoulder. The armor had dissipated most of the blast, but managed to penetrate enough to be a problem.
Suddenly, the anger of her situation flared up and she spun abruptly from behind the building, both guns blazing and a snarl on her lips.
The three pursuing bounty hunters froze momentarily to gape at the crazed female barreling down on them. One of them dropped in his tracks with a smoking hole in his forehead and one in his chest.
The remaining two started firing, but Savannah was no longer in their line of attack. She leaped up, feet scuttling briefly along the wall of one building, then jumped to the opposite wall, all the while firing. When she landed a somersault, both of her attackers lay dead, filling the narrow street with the stench of burnt flesh and ozone. Numerous holes on both sides of the street from stray shots burned with the smell of singed stone.
Savannah surveyed her handiwork, wincing as she worked her injured shoulder. It wouldn't be long before the others on her tail discovered where she was. But now she had breathing room and a genuine chance to make it to her starfighter and off this dustball to rendezvous with Xunrunner...

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[To be continued in the Free Mission: Savannah's Escape]