“Raptor Flight, this is Raptor Three. I’m seeing a flight of X-wing Starfighters crossing past the Rendevous Point, I think they’re going to hit Rolling Thunder.”
He’d just saved Rolling Thunder Three and Four, the pair of AT-AT Walkers that had taken part in the assault on the left flank of the Rebel Lines, from a flight of opportunistic airspeeders, who had punched a hole in the Empire’s anti-air defence grid. There was no way in hell he was about to let this flight of wannabe heroes undo all of the hard work he had done in keeping the ground forces alive. His TIE Interceptor was hovering at the treeline, partially hidden by the canopy of the forest that seemed to envelop this whole damn planet. Encased in his environmentally-sealed flight suit, he couldn’t do anything about the bead of sweat that was rolling down his brow, as he lined up his fighter with the four X-wing starfighters high above, making sure he’d be ready to strike when the order came.
“Raptor Three, we won’t get there in time to stop them. Rolling Thunder is a top-priority resource, we can’t lose them. Can you hold off the X-wings until we get there?”
He had been separated from the rest of his flight on atmospheric re-entry, knocked off course by a near-miss from an opportunistic proton torpedo that someone had seen fit to fire his way. Ever since he had made planetfall, the pilot of Raptor Three had been alone. He’d pushed his fighter to the limits of its endurance to make it to the Rally Point on time, and had actually gotten there /before/ his flight. Now, he was facing off against a flight of the Rebel Alliance’s most advanced space superiority starfighters…though they didn’t even know it. With a certification in scouting, earned entirely VIA means of stealth, he was a master at making TIE craft the one thing they weren’t meant to be.
Sneaky.
“I’ll give them hell, sir. Raptor Three out.”
He had exhausted his complement of four concussion missiles earlier in the mission, taking out a pair of Rebel heavy tanks that had been giving Rolling Thunder some trouble. TIE Interceptors didn’t usually come with anything other than the four laser cannons on each of the blade-shaped wings, but the Vast Empire spared no expense in upgrading their craft. His Interceptor boasted a more powerful generator, slightly upgraded engines and, of all things, a shield generator. He had not had any need for it yet, and had kept it switched off for the entirety of the mission. The extra power had been the reason he had reached his objective so quickly – the exchange of safety for speed was, for him, a natural one. Now, he diverted power from everything he had, even the targeting computer, to his four laser cannons. He switched the fire mode to single-burst, meaning that each of his lasers would fire in turn, providing a withering rate of fire. He sighted the X-wings by eye, calculated for the minimal time the shots would take to reach their target, and like a sniper lining up his prey, emptied his lungs before taking the shot. He lined up the lead fighter, using his cockpit’s re-enforcing metal bars as crosshairs.
“Honour is a fool’s prize. Glory is of no use to the dead.”With that, his finger squeezed the trigger and his fighter bucked slightly as it expelled twelve high-powered laser cannon shots per second, the rate of fire and power of each shot boosted by the sheer amount of energy that the reactor was feeding it. The foliage between him and the target was blasted away as if it had never existed at all, and he saw the faint blue flicker of shields absorbing laser fire. He had been on target. He tracked the X-wing and continued to pump shots into it, and before it had the chance to even take evasive action, the shields petered out, overloaded by the sheer volume of damage being forced at it. The fact that he ships armour held out for almost a second afterwards was a testament to the solid construction and resourcefulness of Incom Corporation, the people who had been responsible for the design of the advanced fighter. After that, however, nothing could save it, and the fuselage became nothing more but a honeycomb, riddled from nosecone to engines with laser fire. He wondered if the pilot had even had time to scream before his death had come. The other three fighters scattered, spreading out to avoid the fate of their leader, for indeed it had been the flight leader whom the young pilot had just sniped clear from the sky, and as an explosion lit up the sky, he smiled in grim satisfaction. Ambush successful, one enemy down already.
“Once you have taken the shot, move on. Only a fool shoots from the same position twice – and I don’t tolerate fools in my force.”That was what Sniping Instructor Larkin had said, back when the pilot was with the elite Timbra Ott Defence Force, undergoing marksmanship training. He had taken the lesson to heart, and dumped the sum total of his reactor’s output into the engines, the sheer acceleration forcing him into the back of his chair and putting a pair of black spots at the edge of his vision, a testament to the high amount of g’s he must be pulling. More used to atmospheric flight than most spacers, he paid this no mind, knowing his body’s limits perfectly. He could handle a high-g climb as well as he could a stall – it was the turns that were the real killer. He shot skyward from the treeline like a blaster quarrel from a bowcaster, putting podracers to shame with the sheer speed at which he raced, directly towards the sun. He appeared as a blur to the X-wing pilots, who, shocked, demoralized and confused by the sudden loss of their commander and the sheer ferocity of the ambush, were unable to organize any kind of response, other than to scatter and re-think their position, forming back up as the 2nd in Command finally restored some measure of order.
“Might as well be saluting ‘im, ya bloody diagonal-botherers.”He chuckled to himself, thanking the enemy for giving him such an easy target as he banked sharply and turned back the way he had come, recognized who this was instantly, simply by the fact that the other two fighters were moving to form up on him, using their leader as a moral, psychological and physical landmark from which to start their fight. He dumped some power into his targeting computer, then halved the rest between his fighter’s Twin Ion Engine and the laser cannons. Diving straight towards the enemy fighter, he planned to pull that landmark out from under them. Screaming down with the sun at his back, the enemy couldn’t face him or even look at him without blinding themselves, and Raptor Three’s pilot used the advantage he had taken from the terrain to full, merciless effect. Green light stitched the air in between the diving Interceptor and its doomed target, and this time, its destruction was almost instantaneous, the heavily customized targeting computer ensuring that almost every shot hit. The R2 unit was destroyed first, but the next three shots slammed into the cockpit, vaporizing the pilot. Definitely didn’t have the chance to scream.
“Two down! That the best ya can do? How the hell did you spice-sniffers destroy the Death Star anyway?”They couldn’t hear him, but they seemed to understand the intent behind his words. Operating from rage and probably grief, the two fighters turned on him as he shot past them, and the young pilot was forced on the defensive for the first time in the battle. With two fighters to his one, he knew things were going to be difficult. Re-routing power from the lasers to his engines, he decided to put the pilots through their paces. He pulled up above the treeline, so sharply that he blacked out for the merest hint of a second, but he kept the ascent through that moment and found himself flying level when vision returned, before jinking to the right in time to avoid a quad-linked laser blast that would have ended him like a sarlaac ending a bantha – permanently. He jinked back to the left, and narrowly avoided death again, before killing the engines. Apparently, this move had not been expected by one of the fighters, as it screamed overhead, right past him. Dead in his sights. The young pilot smiled under the dark of his helmet as he aimed the kill-shot, but his prey had a surprise in store for him.
“Hah! Wanna play nuna, eh? Well mate, you’re on!”The speed at which the fighter managed to pivot around surprised him, executing a three-point turn using the four thrusters and the reverse option afforded to it with skilful aplomb. The pilot of Raptor Three found in the desperate manoeuvre a talent that impressed him to no end. This was a gut-pilot, an adrenaline-pilot, flying by the seat of his pants and getting out the best of his craft without even realizing it. Had the angle been off by a second, the wings would probably have sheered clean off. How the pilot had managed to avoid passing out was a complete mystery to him, but he was glad for it. This pilot was a worthy foe. The two faced each other, frozen in time for a moment as the adrenaline slowed everything down to a crawl. In that moment, the two pilots realized that only one of them would survive the next minute. He grinned, gunned the engine on the fighter and poured power into the laser cannons – it was time to do this.
“Endgame.”Never giving up the forward momentum, he full knew that the enemy had the advantage of range on him – his only chance was to avoid the first shot, then deliver a close-in kill. His heart beat slow in his chest, his breathing cool and calm. In that precious moment, precariously balanced between life and death, he felt…at peace. He felt home. A small smile appeared on his face, soft and subdued, as he gunned the engines and threw his fighter into a sharp climb – just in time. Blazing red seared out below him, flashing just past the metallic belly of his fighter. Immediately, he let his nose drop and drew a bead on the fighter’s cockpit. He quad-linked his laser cannons, and grinned to himself as he pulled the trigger. No way could the shields stand up to a point-blank blast like that, and the TIE Interceptor sailed over a scrapped fighter, its cockpit blown clear out. It sailed towards the ground, dead.
“Raptor Three, this is Raptor Leader – we see you clear. Three kills – damn well do…Raptor Three! Evade, evade, you’ve got a torpedo on your tail! Get out of there!”Oh, just bloody perfect.
- OOC:
- 1,840 Words: I call this "Surprise!"
