It wasn’t meant to be a subtle operation – he was to drop into the system, race through it gathering what intelligence it could, and then jump out when things got too hot or it had all that it needed. When he did, the small cruiser that had dropped him off would come to the rescue. It wasn’t meant to be a stealth job at all, and the TIE Vanguard wasn’t a stealth fighter. Sure, it had exchanged its starboard laser cannon for sensors that ranged farther than any capital ship’s, and it had manuverability that put it on par with a TIE Interceptor, but if it got spotted, it would have to rely on speed to escape. When the TIE Vanguard was dropped off at the system adjacent to the target, he had been instructed to find out everything he could about the suspected pirate base before the IFC-II Fearless made the jump towards the system. Just a last-minute check before they hit it. Still a cadet, Sam realized that his instructors had shown a lot of faith in him by suggesting that he undertake the operation. That, and the fact that losses had been high after the last mission, made this chance possible.
It wasn’t meant to be a stealth operation at all, but Sam Jack Dunn, currently top of his class and in hot contention for the Star of the Academy medal, was all for doing his best to make it such. Having grown up on a rioting prison world, he knew just about everything there was to know about evading detection, and he planned to put every bit of it into use today. He’d already used his mechanics skills to make sure that the fighter felt like an extension to his own body, and had tuned the scanners for maximum range and efficiency. If he did well, he’d get everything he needed long before he was in their scanner range. It didn’t need to be a hard mission, as long as he was patient and smart about it. The young man, his face hidden under the full-face helmet of his armoured flight suit, punched in the final co-ordinates and made the jump to hyperspace. He had never used a hyperdrive-capable TIE craft before, and this was something of a revelation to him. The stars turned blue, then became streaks as his ship punched through the light barrier as if it was the pitiful cloth armour that New Republic marines favoured.
It was about an hour before the small hyperdrive put the fighter at the very edge of the target system, right on the other side of an asteroid field, as planned. Immediately shutting down everything but the scanners, and boosting them to full power, Sam Jack Dunn made sure that to any sensors, his fighter appeared to be nothing but a dead hunk of scrap metal, the kind that was commonplace in an asteroid field, whilst he pinged the scanners for all that they were worth. His caution served him well, and a nearby fighter patrol, slowly picking their way through the asteroid field, passed him by without ever entering visual range. In the asteroid field, using visuals for anything other than dodging big rocks wasn’t likely anyway – the pirates would be relying on their sensors to find any hostiles…and Sam Dunn had been blessed with the foresight to install some manuvering thrusters onto the wings of the ship. Using compressed air and tiny bits of thrust, they were used by mining craft and provided the ship with undetectable motion…though it was painfully slow.
Sam didn’t mind. He wasn’t going to want to move too fast, anyway. Movement was the first thing that was easily noticeable. The second, of course, was a hot drive signature for scanners to pick up on. He gripped the control yoke in a gentle hold, and started to slowly, carefully use directed thrusts from the mining thrusters to manuver himself through the asteroid field, making sure to keep away from the various patrols that were in place and to keep his energy signature as low as possible, turning the sensors way down whenever a patrol strayed a little too close for comfort, then waiting for them to pass before moving on. He detected lots of retrofitted models – Uglies, restored clone wars fighters, it looked like there was easily a squadron out there. Bigger numbers than intelligence had predicted – that was going to be a problem. He catalogued every single patrol craft into his datapad, noting down makes, drive signatures and any quirks that he noted. The Y-Ties, for example, were running hotter than normal – chances were, that meant that more powerful shields or weapons had been installed into them, and the generator was running at its limits.
Sam Dunn smiled as he noted down these details, and remembered his briefing. Of course the Vanguard wasn’t a stealth fighter. There was, however, a difference between invisibility and camouflage. He didn’t need to hide his fighter completely, he simply needed to make it look like something else. With no visible signature, thank to his use of retro-thrusters, and no heat-producing life support, his fighter looked to scanners like just another hunk of scrap metal. He’d even hidden his life signature by simply wrapping his flight suit up in enough insulation to make him look like a long-dead corpse. A master of concealment, he put his first lesson into use: Don’t give the enemy a reason to look twice. As he danced amongst the asteroids like a ballerina, he built up a complete picture of the enemy patrols, and after two hours, had determined their patrol pattern and managed to sneak past half of them. Five hours into the system, and he had managed to track down a massive signature that could only be the base.
Like he’d predicted, a large number of the biggest asteroids had been hollowed out, linked together and armed to the teeth in order to make a very well-hidden bastion. The patrols near it had intensified greatly, and it took him a very long time to get close enough for a clear reading. In the end, he had opened up the fighter’s top hatch and used an industrial grappling hook he had brought along to tether the fighter inside one of the holes in the hollow, massive rock. From the relative security of his hidden location, he was able to scan to his hearts content. Six asteroids in total, a trio of Corellian corvettes, and even an old Clone Wars Banking Clan Frigate was there at the moment. Another wing of starfighters, including a couple of cloakshape fighters, and what looked like enough defence turrets to sink the Executor. Sinking was…bad. He reached for the oxygen tank that he had been smart enough to bring along, hooked it up to his flight suit, and settled down for a long wait. He planned to stay there about a day, on minimal power and just running scans, before he was happy that he’d seen enough. He kicked his feet up on the dashboard, leaned back and started cataloguing every detail his scanners brought through…
*FIVE HOURS LATERThe proximity alert was the first sign of trouble that he had. Apparently, his adopted asteroid was in trouble – about to impact with one bigger than itself! He couldn’t stay any longer, no matter how much he wanted to, and so it was that Sam Dunn reluctantly left the grappling hook behind, closed the hatch and fired up the mining thrusters that he had bolted onto the fighter. Knowing that to use the Twin Ion Engine built into it, this close to the pirate base, would mean detection and death, he gripped the yoke and prayed to all the gods, known and unknown, that he would get out in time. He carefully manuvered the fighter past the crags, stalactites and narrow gaps that made up the tunnel that had been formed in the asteroid, and gritted his teeth as a scrape sent a squeal of metal against rock through the fighter, sounding for all the worlds as if it was crying out in pain. Just a scrape, he told himself. Nothing serious. He could feel cold sweat on his forehead as he coaxed the fighter out of the asteroid tunnel, before opening his eyes wide in horror.
He’d come out the wrong end – and now a massive asteroid was looming right up in his face! All pretense of stealth abandoned, he fed all power into the Twin Ion Engine and gunned it, veering to the left at top speed to get out of the way. A titanic collision of rock against rock seemed to crack the world behind him, and then he found himself facing another problem – debris. It took every bit of his will to shut down the main engine and use only the thrusters to evade the bits of broken rock that came his way, and after it had passed, he waited to see if his burst had been detected or not. A minute passed, seeming like an hour, his heart hammering in his chest as he shut down everything, even the scanners, and waited for the glint of light on metal to show him that he would need to run. His every instinct screamed at him to run now, to get out whilst he still could, like a mynock out of hell. He bit it down. If he ran now, he’d be spotted for sure.
Another minute passed…then another. He had to fire the mining thrusters a couple of times to avoid some smaller asteroids, and finally, after half an hour had passed, he felt safe enough to believe that he hadn’t been spotted. Thanking the force, he began the slow, long journey back through the asteroid field, towards a spot pretty distant from his entry route – he knew never to go through the same door twice. It took another six tense hours to make his way clear, dodging patrols and on two occasions shutting down everything and hoping the enemy passed him by, but in the end he managed to get out of the field without detection. He let out a long sigh of relief, and punched in the hyperdrive co-ordinates. The air was getting a little stale, and he couldn’t wait to get back, make his report and have a much-deserved nap. As the stars turned into streaks, he wondered what would have happened if he’d taken the mission like they’d suggested. He didn’t relish te thought of two wings of fighters and a frigate on his tail.
Mission Successful.
- OOC:
- 1,770 words. Alternate Title: The night-vision goggles flatter you more than the closed-circuit video.
