"Boss, we're being shadowed."

"I know. They're either brutally stupid or blatantly obvious. I haven't decided which."

Jinx Zaron had been his backup pilot for about a year now.  Actually, she liked being at the gunnery station, though that didn't provide as much excitement now that the VE had consolidated it's territory and the lanes leading up to Moorja.  Even so, she was quite likely one of the sneakiest individuals he'd ever met.

Though the VCX-820 had space for six gunners, only one other Imperial Center employee was aboard.  Paler Kraik was a rare find: a slicer who actually socialized.  He was the primary gunner/technician/fix-it guru that Fury kept around when he absolutely had to have a crew with him.  Normally, he had the Kodama capable of flight with only a crew of himself. The -820 however, actually was a complicated small battlecraft and he needed the help keeping it spaceworthy.  The intel geeks calling it a mini-frigate weren't all that far off.

The two had been fairly bored on this run. Wroona was a peaceably enough place, with just enough borrowed Core smugness to look down on "pirates" from the Outer Rim.  They were eager to go.

Problem was, they had all been tailed ever since the incident at the cantina.  It wasn't a direct threat, so they couldn't respond to it as they normally did, which was usually to get the jump on the tail and either beat or incapacitate them until they could figure out the reason and get out of the way.

Fury had read, re-read and had been awaiting verification of the information his business contact had given him.  It was time to go fishing with the information but he wasn't sure he wanted a couple of potentially inept tag-alongs chasing after his ship. 

Jinx broke his musing, "Whaddya think boss?"

He sighed. "Oh, let's let them string along behind us. I have some stops to make anyway so we can do the gutter starport tour until they either get bored or do something stupid enough to land in a Rim jail."

Paler just grinned. "I guess we leave the trackers they put on alone?"

"For now. Let's just get off this rock while they still let us."

An hour later, his ship took off and joined the lanes leading to outer space.  Not too far behind it, an old LongScout X7 joined the traffic leading off-planet. This did not go unnoticed.
 
-----------------------
PRF/SM Fury/VEA/TADATH/VE [MoH][SCPx2][PoC][SotE:HC][SotE:VEA][MSM][IOC]
Prefect - Stormtrooper Corps
Administrator - Imperial Center

Yaga Minor.

Not much to look at unless you were a gearhead.  Then the shipyards at least were interesting.

Everything else had that industrialized bleak look of a once-conquered planet not quite rebuilt as occupied to a fare-thee-well.  Yaga Minor was never going to be a resort destination.

Like most of the planets in this part of space, the Imperial presence was more sarcastic irony than an acknowledged rule.  The planet, like many of its other more well-known neighbors were once the regional capitals and headquarters of the Confederacy of Independent Systems.  After the Clone Wars, the nascent Empire had moved in, breaking the backs of the corporations and instilling their rule by force.  The first non-Fett stormtroopers were almost all exclusively given their first few tours putting down rebellions in this region.

The sad part was that, with Palpatine gone and the New Republic's star on the rise; this was the focal point of the Empire, on the bones of their now-dead enemy.  Granted, factions like the Vast Empire were holding their own, but this is where the Imperial leadership had finally stopped running after Endor and the battles thereafter.

The main reason these planets were so secure was solely because of Palpatine's propaganda machine. Early in the first days of the Rebellion, he had lumped the Empire's adversaries as Jedi lovers, malcontents aided and supported by CIS "dead-enders."  The links, though almost entirely untrue, were a constant tool to turn the public tide against the Rebellion.  Therefore, when the Empire beefed up it's positions in the former CIS homeworlds, the Rebellion did not even try to contest the moves.

It was openly given to the Empire to save face in the court of public opinion.  And the Empire had since taken advantage of the gifts.

Only now that they were the Empire's new core planets could the Rebellion cum New Republic move against them here.  And according to the intelligence he had been chasing for weeks, he had.

Two TIEs flew up to Fury's ship and came up along each side.  Paler was manning comms, Jinx was flying, and the two Wroonians were being kept out of the way.  "Yaga Minor Control approves our entry and we have been given clearance to land boss."

"Well, let's not keep these guys waiting. Let's get this damn thing started."
 
-----------------------
PRF/SM Fury/VEA/TADATH/VE [MoH][SCPx2][PoC][SotE:HC][SotE:VEA][MSM][IOC]
Prefect - Stormtrooper Corps
Administrator - Imperial Center

"Paler, any luck?"

Fury was in a quite filthy crawlspace in a shabby tenement adjacent to the Viceroy Hotel, one of the three buildings the New Republic agents and their motley band of associates/hired help were staying. 

At the moment he was torn between reading his datapad or perusing the yellowed flimsy of a pre-Civil War edition of the Holonet News.  He had dug his A-280 rifle out of storage and had a communications suite that almost rivaled the one in his bucket.  His job was merely to monitor, scan, and otherwise do everything but enter the building the New Republic agents were. 

A grainy holoimage sent back to one of Azarna's friends in Wroonian Intelligence had totally upped the scale of concern on this mission.  Another three of their agents were enroute and Fury had activated one of his-quasi legal corporate "security" teams to come to Yaga Minor.  They, of course, had beat the Wroonians here and were already prepositioned around the other two sites, leaving the primary targets to Fury, Paler, Jinx, and the Wroonians.

Jinx was assembling rocket launchers and other more arcane pieces of kit for them.  The Wroonians were actually developing into professional spies and were wiring up the floors above and below the Republic types with a combination of surveillance gear and a couple of old-fashioned gravity bombs...just in case.

Fury was doing the boring surveillance, and Paler was...upside down.

Fury watched him dangling down from a support beam over the landing platform of the Viceroy.  He had so far wired up an audio surveillance rig - it was a popular smoke break area - and was building a various amount of contraptions to amuse himself. He had to avoid dropping anything, including himself, to the security field around the vehicles on the platform.

A stiff voice answered, "I'm fine boss.  Look, we got some of that old-fashioned Dust that the Republic used to use as a tracking device...until, you know, they figured out it was a neurotoxin.  Looks like someone managed to make it safe enough to go back to market.  In any case, I've got a trip sensor that will activate at the first sign of a repulsorlift field once I activate it.  It might not get the first vehicle, but I'll definitely score anything behind it.  But if they have their filtration set high or are recirculating...."

"Never mind that Paler.  We've got it covered. Bob?"

"Hey boss," Paler whispered in panic, "there's someone here. I gotta....Huh?" The slicer could only look on in horror as a shadow came down and picked up a couple packets of Dust from his tool pouch.

"Calm down.  Watch the show."  Fury zoomed in to see the Royal Guardsman he called Bob jump from vehicle to vehicle, never making a sound, never even jolting the vehicles more than a centimeter as he landed on them and pushed off to the next.  He went to each of the three vehicles known to be used by the New Republic agents and entered them using the Force. After a moment in each one, he climbed out slowly and moved on to another vehicle until he was done.  Then he Force launched himself to the roof and disappeared, clicking twice on the team channel.

"Um, boss....What the hell just happened?"

"Friendly Dark Jedi. I'll tell him you said thanks."

"What did he do?"

"From what I can gather, he set each vehicle to vent the external air and then threw some Dust into a vent just for good measure. I think you should wrap up what you're doing and get out of there."

Another two clicks came over the channel.

"Why did you have me hanging by this wire then if this Jedi could have done it all?"

"Practice. Besides, I didn't know he was here until a half hour ago. He likes to hide a lot. Now quit playing around. We're finally going to get to see some action soon if the Wroonians are right about the time schedule."
 
-----------------------
PRF/SM Fury/VEA/TADATH/VE [MoH][SCPx2][PoC][SotE:HC][SotE:VEA][MSM][IOC]
Prefect - Stormtrooper Corps
Administrator - Imperial Center

Fury sat on the same balcony as he had earlier in the day.  At night, the staff let him bring in his bottle of smoke whiskey and let him smoke the nastiest cigarras he could find yet still inhale.  For a small bottle fee and a lot of puffing, he effectively had the entire outdoor seating area to himself.

Which was pretty much a requirement given everything going on below him.  He had a audio pickup in his left ear and was keeping track of the fiasco going on below him.

Every so often he had to mutter encouraging words like, "You know, we do want to make it look like we didn't intentionally trash their ship" and other such bits.

Basically, Paler was still mad at Bob, Bob hated doing menial labor, and Jinx just wanted to plant a thermal det in the hyperdrive just to see what it would do.  The team really needed to deprogram soon. Merchants made horrible soldiers, and Dark Jedis made horrible team players.

Fury, at least, was having fun watching the thing happen. He was finally catching up on his messages when his slicer checked in.

"Boss," replied Paler.  We've got tracking devices on most of the speeders, and Dust in their exhaust ports.  Ditto for a few of the armor kits.  Jinx sabotaged a few of the blaster packs. Plus, this ship is so wired we'll know where it is for the next ten months no matter what they do to sweep it.

"Alright. Clean it up and get out of there.  I'm just now reading that we're on for tomorrow or the day after. Plus, I've got orders from home. We need to wrap this up. Looks like I'm supposed to take the war forward again."

"You got it bossman. I want off this craphole anyway. The sooner the better."     
 
-----------------------
PRF/SM Fury/VEA/TADATH/VE [MoH][SCPx2][PoC][SotE:HC][SotE:VEA][MSM][IOC]
Prefect - Stormtrooper Corps
Administrator - Imperial Center

He was finally getting the grasp of the speeder bike again. At least he hadn't tangled his bike's vanes on a trash container lately. That had been embarassing. 

While the improvised lance was travelling down a major thoroughfare, he took the opportunity to check in with Paler, who was still recce'ing the main Rep safe house and nominally in charge of the show.

"Update for you boss.  A Chariot LAV just showed up at the house.  The rest of the goon squad showed up from the spaceport in a couple of those knock-off repulsorlift transports you see out here in the sticks. Plus a couple speeder bikes but they don't seem to be too good on those.  Probably swoop riders who think they know better."

"Thanks Paler.  How about the Wroonians?"

"Turning over the details of the sleeper cells to the local authorities.  They should be able to give us an hour to get out of here."

"Good deal. And hopefully they bug out of here the second that's done.  Back to the Reps. Any clue as to their armor?"

"Not really. Standard territorial garrison gear. They won't stand out in a crowd. Wait boss.  Yeah, bioscans show the building emptying out. They are boarding the transports....aaaaaaaaaand, they're off.

"We're gonna pack it up here boss. We've got a team hitting the safe house in ten and a team breaking down this place starting now.  I'll move to the designated OP and check in when I'm set up. I'll turn it over to the recce team now. Later boss."

Fury and the four other "scouts" continued their patrol route, every so often stopping at various security checkpoints and shooting the breeze with the troopers there.  The whole gamut of security was around - and on edge.  Troopers scowled under their helmets as CompForce patrols went by. Fury once again was glad not to have to deal with their ilk in VE space.  ISB agents went by in armor blacker than Fury's scouts.  In fact, it was quite a sensation for the eyes.  Many planets hadn't shaken their Clone Wars mania and many of the stormtrooper units had decorated armor patterns that were specific to their units.  This was a far cry from the monochromatic world of Palpatine's military.  Yet another break (or return?) to tradition and not a bad one in Fury's eyes.

Underneath it all - the tension, the slight distrust, the territorial pissings - there was still a feeling of hope, of a sense of camraderie.  Thrawn, despite what anyone thought of him, was trying to pull the Empire back together from the fractured warlordships it had become. 

Granted, there was still the Pestage/Isaard leadership that had picked up the reins from Palpatine, but that was either more tired or alternately cruel than most wanted to see.  For those on the Outer Rim, pushing High Human Culture when surrounded by alien species was a stupid move.  Palpatine's xenophobia was the first thing thrown out the window in those areas.

But now hope. Fury didn't buy into the reason, but he was glad to see the Empire with a smile underneath its helmets for once.

His quiet reflection on the back of a speeder finally came to an end with the announcement that all the Moffs and Generals and, yes, the Grand Admiral, had come together for their talks.  Defenses tightened up and the skies screamed with various TIE patrols high and holocams low.

"Tighten the ring troopers," spoke Jinx, who was acting as lance sergeant.  "We're going to move to our secondary patrol sector. Cue up patrol zone Senth 17 and follow me." Paler had taken the time to give the team authorization for nine different patrol routes. This one was one that gave the faux scouts access closer to the government center but not in the path the Reps were going to take. This would allow easy access but not give up their element of surprise.

---

"WOAH!" shouted Paler over the team's comm.  He had been in position at the team's observation post for over two hours.  By now, any activity would have been good to everyone. 

"Report," cued Fury.  Using civilians always did frustrate his need for efficiency.

Paler recovered.  "Three repulsorlift vans just took out various substations. I think they're going to be able to re-route the power but it smells like a distraction.  Yeah, it is.  Two barracks compounds just got hit with some kind of gas.  It's an old Clone Wars beauty too. Might as well scratch out a few companies of troopers.  Damn."

"Keep us informed. We're going to close in."  Jinx pulled up the Dust monitor, which showed her the trajectory of the Rep soldiers and their gear which had been covered in the tracking mixture.  So far they were holding a perimeter on the other side of the government center from Fury and his team. 

Fury ordered the additional "scouts" to move in closer to the government center.  There were two lances worth of IC security wrapped up in the black armor.  They were in constant contact with Paler, who was pinpointing the Reps observation post.  Once the main force of Reps made their move, the two lances were to simultaneously remove the OP and then take out the Rep's escape vehicles.

"Okay boss. They're making their move."

Fury looked over Jinx's shoulder at the streams of Dust moving into the government center.  Paler was actively shouting in his ear about other travesties befalling the city and planet at large.  Tracking satellites being sabotaged.  Water plants contaminated with biotoxins.  Large explosions at various troop concentrations. Ion bombs going off on AT-ATs and Juggernaut positions. One VSD knocked off its docking moor at the space port.  The whole New Republic Intelligence budget must have been blown on this one op.

As for the Dust trails, the speeder team had stopped and were engaging a security detachment.  The transports roared past them (and three other checkpoints before it), the Chariot blasting away all opposition.  There appeared to be jamming in the building as no calls for help were coming from the building. It was high time they moved in.

"Comm jamming Paler. Find it and sent the cavalry in to neutralize it. We're going in."

"I'll send them as soon as they clear the OP. Looks like they took their vehicles in with them."

"Yeah, looks like it. Keep us clear and get our escape plan set up. And don't stay there too long Paler. I mean it.""

"I've learned my lesson boss. I'm out as soon as I triangulate your problem. Paler out."

Fury charged up his repulsorlifts and gunned his engine.  The kit Jinx came up with even had the old fashioned lances that scouts used to use against Confederate droids.  Might as well spear a Rep while he had the opportunity too.

The team followed, Jinx was yelling at him until the static knocked out her transmission. 

Following his instincts and memory of the grid, he slid along the side of the building until he came to the entry used by the Reps.  Sure enough, the scouts were still mopping up the checkpoint. Hefting the lance, he gunned the engine and rammed the lance into the chest plate of an enemy "scout" as he dropped off a satchet charge.  The blast took care of the remaining team, except for one soldier who came out of the rubble with a blaster in each hand.  A speeder came up behind him and dispatched him with two blaster bolts.

As Fury shook the rest of his tag-along soldier off his lance, Jinx came up to him gesturing wildly. 

Fury pretended he didn't know what she was talking about, whipped the speeder around and kept moving.  She followed, but she didn't seem any calmer. 

A few corridors down he saw the violent path of the Reps become clear again. Bodies of stormtroopers were tossed aside. The only Rep losses were seen when he found an one of the transports smoldering in the side of a wall. It looked to have taken a direct hit or three from a Plex rocket.  The rocket nest was further down the way, with another transport not far down. 

As for the Chariot, it was upside down near the entrance to the grand hall. Furious blasterfire told the rest of the story.

Fury dismounted and his team followed course and fell in behind him.  Jinx pointedly took the lead from him, grabbing onto a deck clearing blaster.  It wouldn't do any good inside the hall itself but the entrance to the hall was still guarded and still in a corridor.

A couple quick blasts of the gun dazed the four defenders. Well-aimed blaster fire took out the rest.  The team stopped at the doors and checked for booby traps.  Jinx took off her helmet and spoke.  "Alright, the boss picked you guys because you're almost as hard as he is.  I had a bonus treat for you.  This just ain't old school armor. It has a blade in its right gauntlet, commando style. Use it like this," as she demonstrated how to bring out the blade.  "Be careful who you aim for in there.  I am uploading the dust patterns left into your armor's targeting systems. Get in close because this jamming is insane.

"According to what Paler told us on the way in, we shouldn't have more than two dozen targets left, given their losses. We can pick out about eight or nine of them. I can't tell with the jamming.  Boss?"

"Thanks Jinx. It's going to be hard and dirty in there. Both sides may chose to fight us. I'm not sure.  Take only five minutes to stay in there. Any more and we're bound to be captured ourselves.  Follow me or Jinx if at all possible. Otherwise, get to the rally point and let's get out of here. Good hunting team."

Fury rose up, grabbed his blaster rifle and cued up his vocoder as loud as possible. Then he kicked open the door and dived in, screaming. He quickly scanned the room as it reacted to the new entry and then saw one stormtrooper flinch. Pointing at him, he yelled, "Tra'avis, I'm coming for you!"

Jinx knocked him down as the return fire got heavy.

"NICE MOVE BOSS!" she yelled, slapping him upside the helmet.

Another of his men pointed him towards Tra'avis, and presumably Berik, moving down the rows to the main dais.

They, and the VE/IC team, had entered to the right side of the conference room/auditorium.  Many of the dead must have been caught in an early blast. Seats and bodies were torn asunder from a horrific impact.  The crater of the blast was where Fury's men had hunkered down as both sides took aim at them.  A quick shot at a New Republic man had turned the Imperials back to shooting at the earlier attackers. 

"Let's move!" yelled Fury.  Two of his men gave cover as he and Jinx ran between a row of seats. They didn't provide any cover but they did a decent job of concealment.  They stopped and returned fire as two men moved forward and the tailing made moved around to provide flanking cover.  The four advanced quickly, alternating between running and firing, until they reached the main body of enemy forces.  Then Fury dropped the rifle, pulled out one of his officer's DC-15S pistols and unsheathed the blade. 

Honestly, even with SpecForce troopers, it wasn't much of a fair fight.  Old Phase II armor was always prized for its sturdiness, and this Phase III stuff was almost to commando specs.  One of his men was finally felled by enemy fire, but they cut through the remainder with little incident.

"You two," he yelled to his remaining upright men, "take him to the rally point. Good luck."  Picking up a T-21, he looked at the rest of the room.  The two Republic soldiers, and three of their guards were alternately stunning and assassinating the thin line of guards protecting the remaining Moffs. Thrawn prominently stood behind a pillar and returned fire as he could.  Fury could see a couple of his guards, Noghri, silently scaling the overhead lights, preparing to pounce on their enemy. 

Tra'avis must have sensed something because he jerked up and raised his weapon.  Fury reacted. It was long range but he was bound to at least ring the man's ears. He took a shot with the T-21. The shot, as he thought, dissipated on the way, but was enough to scorch the Rep's helmet and knock him to the ground.  Berik reacted by grabbing the lead agent and bolted from the room as the Noghri crashed to the ground and began slaughtering the remaining New Republic soldiers.  Thrawn looked over at Fury, who merely gave a mock salute and ran after Berik and Tra'avis, Jinx in tow.
 
-----------------------
PRF/SM Fury/VEA/TADATH/VE [MoH][SCPx2][PoC][SotE:HC][SotE:VEA][MSM][IOC]
Prefect - Stormtrooper Corps
Administrator - Imperial Center