Chapter Fourteen

Stormtroopers ringed the unfortunate beings that had been unlucky enough, or too slow due to their physical attributes, to get to safety. Like statues they stood around them, weapons ready, and the unconscious forms of the ones they had shot were dumped unceremoniously with the others. They all sat, waited and wondered.

Grand Moff Galgen watched the proceedings from the estate’s glass-topped main pyramid, feeling little satisfaction. From this vantage point he could watch the entire proceedings; repulsortanks, landed by the heavier transports, slowly proceeded down the wide speederlanes, turrets rotating. These and other armoured transports deposited even more Stormtroopers who dragged terrified civilians from their homes and businesses. Blue stun blasts traversed streets or illuminated windows as resistance was quashed. A flash of light caught his attention and he turned to watch a burning circular freighter down by the racetrack roll over and slam into a landing pit, the resulting explosion rattling the glass he was looking through and brightly lighting up the darkening sky.

Watched it all impassively, his mind not on the invasion.

He heard the clip of heels behind him and he turned to see Terrov straightening from the customary bow at the waist.

   “Lieutenant Terrov,” he said. “News?”

   “The pacification goes as planned. Several squads have requested to set from stun to kill. Some of the civilians are not scared by the threat of unconsciousness and are trying to form a fight back.”

Galgen sighed, disinterested.

   “Very well, issue the order. What about the primary targets?” There were other personnel in the room and the Grand Moff was trying to act as nonchalantly as possible, giving the impression that these kinds of take-overs were his usual routine and such things were trivial.

But Terrov knew better. Under that calm exterior was the ravaged soul of a man in fear of his future. Galgen sweated profusely, his hand shaking as he reached for a pitcher filled with blue liquid that had been left on the table by a circular arrangement of couches. He poured himself a glass and took a long draught.

   “We have no information yet,” Terrov said.

   “Have you located the governor of the city?” Galgen asked.

   “No, sir. It appears that the governor has fled. What shall we do with him if he is found?”

   “Shoot him and report that he was bought down trying to resist. I am acting governor until this crisis is resolved.”

Crisis? Terrov thought, catching himself before he smiled. Your crisis.

   “Communicate with the Malevolent and inform them we will not be needing the relief ships. I think we can handle this city with what we have.”

   “What if Junduk Major enquires as to our reasons for this invasion?”

Galgen shrugged, thinking such a thing a small matter.

   “If they push for a reply then tell them that a Hutt was murdered and the governor was involved. That makes this entire city a haven for scum, hence our presence.” Galgen motioned for the other officers in the room to leave, and he still stood with his air of authority whilst they walked into the turbolift. When all the amassed had departed, Galgen’s expression collapsed into worry. “Terrov, we have to find them!” he almost shouted.

   “Them?” Terrov asked blandly. “I thought we were hunting the Force user. The boy is a secondary target.”

   “Yes, yes, but the boy must not be harmed. He may be a Force user, also.”

Terrov shook his head. Had Galgen’s mind snapped under the strain? Was he seeing everyone as a threat now? How long would it be before he was seeing Force users bleed from the walls, rise from the ground, fall from the skies. The ancient religion, which very few believed in anyway, was obviously very real to him. He nursed his still aching cheek thoughtfully.

Considering what happened on the Malevolent, he thought, it seems very real to me, too.

Galgen was pacing back and forth, his hands clasped behind his back. The drink had been drained and the glass dropped on the mockleather couch. He turned to say something but was cut off by Terrov’s communicator squealing for attention. He unhooked it from his belt and held it to his lips.

    “Terrov.”

   “Lieutenant,” came a voice from the comlink, “we’ve found the boy!”

It felt strange to Skeet to have someone on the back of his speeder with him and he was desperately doing his best so that he wouldn’t mistakenly do a manoeuvre which would throw officer Eilen from the vehicle. She sat uncomfortably behind him, her arms wrapped around his waist, her body leaning against his and her head pressed between his shoulderblades.

   “Not liking this!” she shouted again over the wind, which streamed past them.

It had been a simple matter to get onto the racetrack through the huge hole the crashed starship had left in the landing pit wall and over the track itself, coming out in the speeder pens where both Skeet and Brey’s bikes were stored. Boron, far too huge to fit behind one of the racers, had opted to stay behind. He was the governors’ aide, and if he was found he could spin all sorts of lies as to where they had gone. Eilen had opted to ride with Skeet, Emag with Brey. The Delvon two-ninety and the Ikas-Ando Starhawk were over-powering as they took the extra weight but both riders were confident that they could handle it. Side by side they had exited the pens and headed into the tunnel, which wound straight to the public landing bays.

Almost immediately they had been shouted at by Stormtroopers to halt. Gunning their engines they had outpaced the troopers as they opened fire with blasters set to stun.

Support wasn’t far away, and four Imperial speederbikes had entered a chase with the fleeing racers and their passengers. The black and white armoured biker scouts were low on their machines, the long forward steering vanes and the heavy engine allowing great speed.

But the racers had built their machines for one purpose; competition. Even with the added weight of passengers they were still achieving incredible speeds.

They wound their way through stilled speeders, past checkpoints and barricades erected to stop the flowing traffic of Raca City so that the civilians could be searched and detained. In and out of the lines of vehicles they sped, sometimes over if the craft was low enough, causing startled civilians and angry troopers to dive out of their way. Blue stun bolts probed them at every turn.

Until the final run to the hangars. As they came out of a particularly tight corner, one of the chasing scouts opened fire. Its light cannon under its forward section spat red light and it erupted against the walls and other vehicles. Startled, Brey had braked and tried to slide out of sight down a side road but found himself cut off by a heavy repulsortank.

He braked even more sharply, feeling Emag’s weight shifting against him and saw the turret lock on. He spared a quick glance over his shoulder and saw one of the pursuing biker scouts closing. As the barrel of the tank levelled he gunned the engine, pulling up sharply and interposing himself between the cannon and the scout. As the tank fired he dived.

The Aratech military speeder bike was more or less vaporised by the blast, the vehicle erupting violently and the trooper being thrown through the air to smash through an empty parked speeder’s window. Brey whooped his delight and Emag pounded him on the back.

   “Pretty neat, huh?” Brey shouted, smiling at Emag’s obvious thumps of respect.

   “Just get us to the bay, you idiot!” Emag shouted, and looked over at Skeet’s bike.

   “How are we doing?” Skeet shouted over the noise. Eilen looked back and then shouted, “There’s still three on us!”

   “Where are they headed?” Galgen demanded as Terrov listened to the updates coming through on his comlink.

   “To the landing bays, I think. A squad has already located the vessel they used to travel to the Malevolent. If they’re heading for that, they’re in for a surprise.”

The Delvon two-ninety was losing power, in no small part to the laser blast it had received in its rear compartment. Skeet growled and thumped the control readouts as the speeder bike’s top speed was slowly decreasing. Eilen shook him.

   “What’s wrong?”

   “I’m leaking thrust pressure!” he shouted.

   “But the bay is just ahead!” Eilen pointed to the entrance to the landing bays that was little more than five hundred meters ahead of them. Skeet nodded and applied more thrust.

One of the pursuing speeder bikes suddenly appeared to their left, the biker scout pulling a blaster from a leg holster. He flicked the weapon active with his thumb and tried to level his bike for a shot.

Skeet just swung his bike over; it was already badly damaged and one more dent wasn’t going to slow it down any further. Skeet had seen an abandoned speeder just ahead that the trooper was obviously unaware of, intent as he was on shooting the fleeing biker. The speeders connected, the Aratech sluing sideways. Before the biker scout could fathom what had happened his bike had slammed into the speeder and catapulted him over it There was no explosion as the bike crumpled into the vehicle and flipped over it, cartwheeling end over end and throwing chunks of its bodywork in all directions. The biker slammed onto the roof of another vehicle, the windows shattering outwards, and then rolled down the ground.

Skeet looked over at Brey to see how he was doing. As he saw his eyes widened and his jaw clenched.

Brey was doubled over, smoke spewing from a gaping hole in his stomach. Emag was shaking him, trying to keep him upright and on-target but it was obviously doing no good. Skeet looked back and saw that the other two pursuing bikers had dropped back and out of sight for some reason, and as he looked forward he could see why.

A repulsortank had blocked the entrance to the Happy Contriver’s landing bay and several Stormtroopers stood around it, weapons aiming down the street to where the racers were coming from. The turret of the tank, too, was aiming in their direction.

Skeet swung his bike over and caught hold of Brey’s steering handles, guiding both vehicles to the relative safety of an overpass, out of sight of the troopers. He leaped from his bike and dived over to his friend.

   “Brey! Oh, my...”

   “Oh, that’s just great!” Brey tried to shout, the pain causing him to clench his teeth and hiss. “I get shot and then you get my name right!”

   “A lucky hit from a Stormtrooper taking pot shots as we passed,” Emag explained.

   “Not lucky for me,” Brey said. Eilen pushed Skeet out of the way, grabbed Brey’s stiffened hands and pulled them out of the way of the wound. With constant hisses and groans from Brey she pulled back the smouldering cloth of his vest and checked the wound.

After a few moments she looked with sad eyes at both Skeet and Emag, and then turned her gaze to Brey.

   “I’m sorry...” was all she could manage.

   “Bad one, huh?” Brey said, coughing violently.

   “You need proper bacta treatment.”

   “Oh, like I’m gonna get that now.” With trembling fingers he pulled a flask from his inner pocket and pulled the stopper out with his teeth. He spat it out and took a long drink. “What’s the situation?”

   “There’s a repulsortank blocking the entrance to the bay, Brey,” Skeet said, smiling as Brey did as he said the two versions of his friend’s name together. “We’re trapped.”

   “Help me up,” Brey insisted. They pulled him to his feet and he directed they should help him to his speeder.

Skeet looked perplexed.

   “What are you going to do?”

   “I’m going to distract them, give you a chance of getting in. Here, swap jackets.”

   “Brey, you can’t ride!” Eilen snapped. “You need treatment!”

   “And you can’t fool a tank into thinking you’re Skeet!” Emag added.

Brey shooed them off as he gingerly climbed onto his speeder, shrugging into Skeet’s jacket.

   “Maybe so, maybe not, but at this juncture it’s the only chance you’ve got. Skeet, in my jacket pockets are the ships passcards and details. Take it, get away. I’m not going to pretend to understand what’s going on.”

   “Brey, I...”

   “Shut it. I’ve always been right before and I’m not quitting now. You’ll also find the Tatooine Ten Thousand pass. If you get there, do it. My speeder’s in the Happy Contriver’s hold. I’ll distract the troops and then get treatment.”

Skeet gripped his friend by the shoulder and they stared at each other for a second before Skeet threw his arms around him in a tight hug. Brey grimaced at the pain but returned it all the same.

   “Take care. All of you.” He started the engine and moved out into the street, lining himself up with the tank. He revved the engine and lowered his goggles.

Skeet watched sadly as his friend gunned the engine and let go of the brakes. The speeder shot forward, attaining speed and whining loudly. The Stormtroopers obviously heard it, too, and they trained their weapons on the approaching biker.

As the bike shot down the speederlane Skeet put his hand to his mouth. There was a feeling, a strong feeling emanating from Brey. A feeling of loyalty to his friend who he had known for only a short time, a feeling of trust.

Of sacrifice.

   “He’s not going to swerve!” Skeet shouted and leapt out of hiding, watching with horror as Brey applied more power to the engine and kept on his collision course. Emag jumped out also, Eilen close behind.

   “Brey, no!”

 The troopers were firing now, their blaster bolts exploding all around Brey as he approached. Shots struck the speeder but it still kept coming. One even tore into Brey’s shoulder but he didn’t stop. The engine whined and screamed, as he got closer, the shots more accurate and taking off huge chunks of the vehicle, which seemed to stay together now by Brey’s will alone.

He pumped a fist into the air as his speeder headed straight for the repulsortank.

   “Race winner Brey Yard!”

To Skeet it all seemed to happen in slow motion as the Ikas-Ando Starhawk tore into the tank at an unimaginable speed. The resulting explosion ripped the tank to pieces, the Stormtroopers flung lifelessly from the carnage as they were swept away by concussion and fire. The bay doors were ripped apart, the structure above collapsing as the entire street was consumed by the fireball.

Skeet just stared, not believing, not wanting to believe. All he could do was scream.

   “Breeeyyy!!!”