OOC:

I know that official orders have yet to come on our phase II.  However, as I have been told vague details that will let me know what we are doing, I thought I can start this out to pull us out of our little lapse in activity.  Problems or questions, please PM me.

“Booooring...” Jelly strode into Doc’s office, flicking the light switch as he entered.  Looking up from the datapad that was occupying him earlier, Riq turned off the lamp and blinked a few times to adjust to the brighter ceiling lights.

“Jabs, you really should enjoy the time off, been a while since we could really relax.  Besides, we don’t really need to kill something every day...” he paused for a second, realizing who he was talking to, “...well most of us anyways.  Besides, I got some outline stuff for our next mission, was just reading it.”  Jelly’s posture quickly straightened at the mention of some time in the field and Riq shrugged, “Mind getting everyone in the usual sim room?”

Jelly’s expression drooped slightly, but he was still happy to be doing something, seeing his change of impression, Riq assured the Fire Team Captain, “It’s a sim to get us prepared for our real mission.  Something we have yet to do, and could use a little practice.”

Giving a crisp salute, Jelly turned heels and left the office, flicking the light switch back off.  Riq sighed and fumbled for his lamp’s ‘on’ setting.

---

The squad was in their lounge clothes, or as some people called them: civilian garb, waiting for one of the techs to finish uploading the scenario.  Meanwhile Doc was giving a basic run down of what they were going to do, “This is an infiltration, basically getting into a little a group and pretending to be on their side while we complete an objective.  Since we don’t have the time to really set up a whole sim from scratch we are using a standard sim scenario, which really will not have anything to do what we are doing.”

Riq scrolled along his datapad until he came to the part he wanted, “Alright, the sim conveniently puts us right into the group we infiltrated as new members.  This is a criminal organization on Tadath called the The Shadows’ Shadows, or better known as the Double Shadows, runs drug dealings and the like.  We have a background as a former merc group out of work.  You each have a false name to go by, mine will be Escal Krth, the merc group leader.  Our objective is to gain proof of their leader’s activities, and to download files from his computer, and then arrest him.  To do this, we of course have to pretend to be on their side.  Shouldn’t take more than a day if you ask me,” he gave a wink, “We’re that good.”

Seeing one of the techs nod and flash a thumbs up, Riqimo put the datapad aside and clapped his hands, “Okay boys and gal, we get a little fun time now.”  Doc rolled his shoulders as he slid into his his simulator seat, a familiar, soothing hum filled his helmet as the simulators started up. Then his vision went black and an image began to fade into focus...

"Alright, Bright, I'm gonna take it back another hundred yards or so." Sargent Godfrey called from the targeting sim controls. "Lets see what you can do at five hundred shall we."

"I'm not a sniper, Sarge." Brightstar called back  but rellished the challenge her mentor was providing. She and Godfrey were in the shooting range having a friendly competition that Brightstar was currently losing. Of course, she never really did expect to win, Godfrey Sintar had a few more years of experience that she didn't. it was all fine by her especially as she was not making it easy for Godfrey to win.

"Ready?" He asked with a grin.

"Of course." Bright responded in kind, and held her weapon up and sighted along the barrel. In the blink of an eye the target was up and she shot hitting it just barely off the center, the whoop of excitement from Godfrey in the targeting booth next to her suggested that he had hit his target dead on. Bright pressed her lips together and waited for her next target.

"Sorry to interupt. Sgt. Godfrey, I think you were winning anyway." Jelly said as he entered the room and shut the targeting sim down. "Doc wants us in the usual sim room for a little practice." He said directly to Bright.

Brightstar lowered her weapon and looked back at Jelly Bean with a quick and thankful smile. She had always hated losing.


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In the usual sim room, Bright took her usual spot leaning against the wall. She couldn't help but smile as Doc read off the instructions given for the sim. "Ah. Aha. You should feel right at home then Riq." She said with a undertone of annoyance. "I'll take the name of Endel Saan." She said before following in Riqimo's footsteps to the sim chair on his left  and slipped the helmet onto her head just as she caught a glipse of Jelly sliding into the chair on her own left.

"You must be the mercs that we asked for." Said a tall man with dark hair and even darker eyes. "Well its about time, You guys took your time." The mans eyes flicked over the group standing before him. It didn't pass Brightstar's notice that they seemed to linger a bit longer on her before they rested again on Jelly, now under the alias of Diz. "Well I suppose you'll do."

"Glad you think so." 'Diz' said with a toothy grin.

Bright gave a bit of a half hearted smile and batted an eyelash or two in the man's general direction. No way was she going to be in this guys presence longer than she had to be.

"Right then, This way." The dark man said turning on the spot with a distinctly larger smile on his face and waving for them to follow. As she followed Brightstar sidled over a bit closer to Jelly so she could talk to him without arousing any suspicions.

"Please tell me the leader of this ring is at least better looking than this guy." She breathed in a well practiced manner.

"Don't worry I'm sure he is." Jelly said almost jovialy. "At least for our sake I hope he is."

Brightstar was grateful for Jelly's intervention and hoped to all the gods ever worshipped that this wouldn't happen in the real situation. She made certain the man, Martel, knew that she was more than capable with a blade and even more effective with it than he could ever hope to be before letting Jelly take the knife from her hand.

As it grew darker, Brightstar instinctively began listening harder. The only woman on this 'missiom/simmulation', she was also the one with the best hearing. If they were to be attacked from behind or from another shadowed corner she would hear them before she saw them. Along those lines she already knew that they were being followed.  Although she could still see Jelly, 'Diz', she walked closer to him anyway and whispered low, "Two more behind us," She smiled a bit. "I don't think they are very trusting people."

Jelly nodded his head in understanding but did nothing else. Bright took it to mind that he had just added her statement to a mental list of other things about this place.

With that in mind Bright began running through her own mental checklist. Its not like she had never infiltrated criminal rings before, which during her time with Riqimo she had, but nothing quite so intimidating or annoying.

Finally reaching their destination, Brightstar and Jelly were lead through a series of doors and sharp turns and a final door into a brightly lit room. After the darkness of the corridors they had just exited Brightstar had to blink spots from her eyes.

"Whats this?" Said a deep voice. Bright guessed it was coming from the center of the room for which she was looking at. Sure enough there stood a man no taller than Jelly and slightly more rotund. His Blonde hair was sharply parted down the middle and he had a bit of a stubble growing on his sharp chin. All in all he wasn't bad looking but he still had a hard and no nonsence face. Jelly is much better looking. Bright thought first and for most and blushed slightly before looking down with the pretext of admiring the floors.

"The mercs you asked for, Sir." Martel said standing straight backed.

Sir? They call him Sir. Not by a nickname Bright examined the faces of the other thugs that had brought them and caught sight of Scooter, who shrugged slightly. The others were just as rigid, almost as if they had stopped breathing.

"That is a woman not a mercanary gentlemen." 'Sir' said in an over sweet voice that plainly said he held no respect for women what so ever. His look plainly said that he was about ready to give Brightstar the boot.

"Guess I'll just have to show you what I'm really capable of you pathetic meat sack." Bright said under her breath and only loud enough for Jelly to hear before she decided on just how she would show this idiot who he was dealing with.

In an instant, Brightstar and not only disarmed the thug to her right but she had managed to get the blaster up into the firing position before man had even taken notice. In the next instant she was behind the man they called "Sir" with the blaster pointed at the base of his skull. "And you are a coward not a Sir." She said whispering in a low and deadly voice.

The other men made move to the rescue of their boss but the man held up a forstalling hand. "I see you are not without skills. You could be useful." He said with new found respect. "Useful indeed. The name is Draken Bliin, and yours miss?" Draken asked.

"Endel Saan, Mr. Bliin. A pleasure I am sure." Bright said as she backed away from Draken and slid the blaster back to its original owner.

"What say we talk business now, Mr Bliin." Jelly said looking at Bright with a gleam of approval in his eyes.

Wicket went through the dark dank alleyways of the south side of the city. It wasn't quite as dirty as Abregado-rae, but it was pretty close. Lots of people were wandering the streets. Some of them were drug dealers, others were prostitues, but most were homeless. Wicket gripped his gun in his jacket but didn't take it out. As they walked through the streets and heard noises that no other should here, Wicket became afraid. No Wicket, you can not go back to your old ways. You are stronger now Wicket thought to himself as he took a deep breath in.

Goblin noticed a look of fear on Wicket's face. "Ey, you ok? You don't look too good."

No not really. Wicket thought. He knew he couldn't tell Jag and Goblin that. "Yeah I'm fine, just got taken back a bit for a minute. Thought I saw something, but I'm good now." Wicketsaid, lying through his teeth. "We're almost there." Wicket looked at his datapad then looked up at the buildings. "Yeah that one right there." he said, pointing to the apartment complex. The group picked up their pace.

Upon reaching the apartments, Jag noticed you needed to contact someone to have them open the door. "Great you guys, how are we gunna get in? We need to have someone come open this door, and we don't know anyone who lives here."

"Well why don't we just ask one of the people we need to collect the money from?" Wicket replied.

"Yeah great idea Wicket." Goblin sarcastically said.

"Oh really, thanks!" Wicket said with a smile.

"No, jackass. It wasn't a great idea. What are we gunna do. Call him and say, 'Hey this is someone who wants to take money from you otherwise you will die.' Then he calls the authorities and we end up getting arrested. Why don't you think a little?" Goblin said.

"Ok guys enough." Jag said sternly. "We will just have to find another way in. No big deal. After all look at this place. I'm sure there is a broken window or an unlocked door. Just start to look."

They all split up to go search around the building. Wicket walked around and found a little courtyard near the back. He searched for anyway to get inside. Wicket walked over to every window in the courtyard. Damn, I guess this place is safer than it looks. Wicket thought to himself.

Meanwhile Goblin went to the left side of the building. There was not much on that side except a few broken window about six stories up. Other than that there wasn't much. Jag on the other hand went to the right side. There he saw some broken alchohol bottles and a homeless guy sitting under a tree talking to someone. "Hey you!" Jag shouted in the man's direction. The man looked over.

"Whadda you wan." The man said with slurred speach.

What am I on? Jag thought to himself That doesn't make sense He thought for a few more seconds. Oh, what do I want. Jag went over to the man. "Yeah, do you know how to get in that building. I was in my friends earlier and I forgot to get something, but he left and now I can't get back in."

"Well you ne a key or summing. Orways you won able get in." The man said, with the stench of alcohol on his breath.

Jags nose crinkled up. "Well do you knw were I could find a key?"

The man pulled out what looked to be a key card. Jag reached his hand out as if to grab it. Before Jag could take it, the man pulled it away. "No! I wan some creds fo it." Jag sighed and called for Wicket.

Wicket was still in the courtyard when he heard his name. They must have found a way in! Wicket rushed over to where the sound was coming from. He saw Jag waving his hand to come to him. "You found a way in?" Wicket asked.

"Yeah but this guy wants some credits for a key to get in." Jag said.

"Well why don't you give him some." Wicket asked looking at Jag. Jag looked back at Wicket with a look that said 'Oh come on. You think I'm gunna waste my money.' Wicket sighed. "Fine." He took out some spare credits he found on his way to the apartments. "Here." Wicket said as he tossed them at the man. The drunk caught them and became happy at the sight of five credits. Before the man could say anything, Wicket and Jag rushed off to find Goblin.

"Thanks!" The man shouted far off in the distance.

They found Goblin and went back to the front of the building. They located the key swiper and entered the card. The door squeaked open slowly, then they entered. The apartment lounge seemed to be kept nice and neat. It didn't have much of an odor, not a bad one at least. Wicket looked at his datapad and looked where the first man's apartment was. "Looks like we need to go to the third floor, room C12." Wicket said.

The group went up the steps to the third floor. Goblin noticed a sign on the door.

They followed the sign down to the room. The door was cracked open. Jag peaked in the door and saw a man sleeping on the couch. "He's in there. Ready?"

"Yeah."Wicket said. "But let's be sneaky about this so we don't disturb anyone." Wicket opened the door slowly. Jag and Goblin followed. Once inside Goblin closed the door quietly. They went over to the man sleeping on the couch. Goblin pushed the man in an attempt to wake him. The man didn't move. Wicket looked down at his datapad. "His name is Garon."

"Garon!" Goblin shouted. The man did not move. Jag shook him again. Still, Garon did not move. "Oh for crying out loud!" Goblin yelled. He then slapped the man across the face. Garon jolted to his feet. Wicket and Jag drew their weapons.

"You owe us money. And we want it now." Wicket said with his pistol pointed at Garon's head. "You are overdue. Boss doesn't like it when people are overdue on payments. Now you either give us the money or say bye bye to life." Wicket demanded. Goblin and Jag looked at each other in amazement. They had never seen Wicket act like that.

Garon became frightened. "Ok ok. You got me. Please don't shoot. I have the money over here." He went over to a cabinet in the far corner of the room. He opened it and took out a case of money. "It should all be in there. Just take the money and leave. Please." Wicket snatched the money from him.

"Good. You're lucky this time. Don't be late on the payments again." Wicket said. "Come on boys." Wicket said exiting the room. "Oh and one more thing, don't call the authorities. I own you." Wicket tried to pull a Frank. Jag slammed the door.

Wicket took a sigh of relief. "Ok that was easy. Let's hope the other two are that easy."

"Well they way you handled it. I'm sure they will be." Goblin said. "You looked like a pro."

Wicket smiled. "Oh you have no idea." Wicket looked at the datapad. "D5. Name is Cersi. Let's go." The group head off to the next room.

Wicket climbed the steps up to the fourth floor followed by Jag and Goblin. Once they reached to top of the steps they saw the same sign. This time instead of going right, they needed to go left. Room D5 was all the way at the end of the hall. Wicket reached for the button to open the door. "It's locked." Wicket whispered. "What do we do?"

Goblin thought for a moment. "Well we could always break the door open, or try to knock and see if anyone answers. I'd rather not break the door, as it will make too much noise. Try knocking first."

"Alright. If that doesn't work we'll try something else." Wicket said. He knocked on the door softly. No one came. Then he knocked a little louder. Still the door did not open. Wicket tried a few more times with no success. "We'll any ideas?"

"Wicket, shouldn't you be able to open the door by cutting the wires or something. I thought that's what Combat Engineers did." Jag replied.

"I guess I could give it a try." Wicket said as he took out a bag of supplies. He reached in and grabbed some wire cutters and connectors. Then Wicket stooped down and tried to find where the wires would be stored. He looked around and noticed a small compartment at the bottom right hand of the door. Ah, here we go. He opened it up and cut a few of the wires. After a few rearrangements were made, the door flew open. "Got it."

Wicket got up and followed Goblin and Jag into the room. "What's this guys name again?" Jag asked searching the apartment.

"Uh..I forgot. Gimme a sec." Wicket looked down at his datapad and searched the info. "Here we are, his name is Cersi Fraa. He's about six feet and two hundred pounds. Long blonde hair too. So Let's just keep looking. Jag go into his bedroom. Goblin you hit the kitchen, and I'll do the living room."

The group split up and searched the house. Wicket looked through the living room. He didn't find anything but leftover food on the corner table. Other than that, the room was kept quite nice. He then headed to the kitchen to help Goblin. "Find anything?" Wicket asked.

Goblin shook his head. "Nope, not a thing." He took a bite of some food the he got out of the Frigidaire.

"What are you eating? Did you get that out of his fridge?" Wicket asked.

"Yeah. I was hungry." Goblin said. "Let's go help Jag. Nothing in here." Goblin finished up the food he was eating the took a drink straight from the sink. Wicket shook his head.

As Wicket and Goblin headed to the bedroom, they heard Jag's voice. "Hey you guys! Come on in here!" Wicket and Goblin ran into the room.

The stench was horrifying. It smelled as if the toilet hadn't been flushed for a month. There stood Jag over by the closet. Inside, there was a body hanging from a rope that was tied to the ceiling. "Looks like he killed himself. He left a note too. Take a look." Jag ripped the paper that was taped on Cersi's body and handed it to Wicket. Eww, nasty. Wicket thought as he handed the paper to Goblin.

Goblin began to read the note. "It says: Dear Bastards, I hope you are happy. Look what you made me do. I did not have enough money to pay you back. I knew you were going to kill me, so I decided to save you the trouble. I left you what money I could. You can find it under the bed. Well that's a shame." Goblin said.

Wicket went over to the bed and knelt down. He found a basket with two hundred forty eight credits in it. "Found the money guys." Wicket pocketed the money. "What should we do with the body?"

"I spose just leave it there." Jag replied.

"Good, cause I wasn't touching him. Anyway we got this one done with, let's hurry up and find the last guy." Wicket said as he led them out of the room.

Jag and Goblin gathered around Wicket to get the next piece of information. "Man it smelled in there." Wicket said as he scrolled through his datapad. "Ok looks like this last guy is on the bottom floor. A20 is the room. His name is Bernold. Looks like he is about five feet one inch."

"Short little fellow, eh?" Jag said with a snicker. "Ok let's go get him then." They went down the steps. The halls were quiet like they should be at this hour in the morning. They reached the bottom floor and headed to the end of the hall. Bernold's door was at the very end. Wicket pushed the button and the door opened. "Well that was easy." Wicket said.

"Yeah...A little too easy." Goblin replied, drawing his pistol. Jag and Wicket did the same. The group walked through the apartment but couldn't find anyone. "Well where is he?"

The group searched for a few more minutes. Then suddenly a short man walked through the door with a bag of groceries. "Who are you guys!" The man said in a high pitched voice.

"Cut the crap. You know who we are." Wicket said with his blaster pointed at the man. "Now give us the money or you won't live to see tomorrow."

"Make me!" The man screeched as he dropped the bag of food and ran towards the door. Before he could take three steps, shots from the blasters were made. None killed him but they made him drop to the floor. Wicket rushed up to the man, grabbed his arms, and twisted them behind him.

"Now give us the money before I snap your neck like twig." Wicket said forcefully.

"Never!" Bernold said. Wicket motioned for Goblin.

Goblin's boots clunked on the floor. Bernold became more tense. "I suggest you listen to the Sullustan, you scum." Goblin spit at the Bernold's face.

"Fine. Alright, I have the money. All I have is on this credit chip. If I could possibly get up, I would be able to give it to you." Bernold said. Wicket let go of him. Bernold scurried fro the door but was too slow for Jag's finger. A shot rang from Jag's blaster and Benold collapsed to the floor. Wicket went over and dug in his pocket. He felt around for the chip.

"Got it. Let's go guys. Our work here is done." Wicket said. Goblin spat on Bernold once more. Finding amusement out of it, Jag did the same. The group went out side and headed back to the north side of town to meet up with Frank.

They walked through the streets and made it to Frank's apartment. Wicket led the group up the steps and into his room. "I see you made it back." Frank said. "How'd it go."

"Well we got all the stuff. Garon said it should all be in this container." Wicket said. Jag handed him the container. Frank counted the credits and smiled. "Cersi on the other hand, killed himself. We found him dangling from a rope with a note attached. Goblin give him the note." Goblin took out the letter and handed it to Frank.

Frank laughed. "Haha. This is great."

"Yeah and here are the credits he left." Wicket handed over the credits. "Then Bernold tried to escape so we dealt with him. We got this credit chip from him that he said had all the money you wanted."

"Good. You guys done great. You think you are up for another mission?" Frank said with a grin.

Wicket looked at Goblin and Jag. They all agreed that another mission would be wise. Only doing one would not give enough trust for them to get the information they needed to arrest the crime lord. Wicket looked back at Frank. "You got yourself a deal." Wicket answered. "What will we be doing this time?"

"Very well." Frank said, his eyes lighting up. "This one will be a little trickier as it will require you to do two things. You see, we supply a great deal of spices, mainly ryll, to this company. They then resell the spice on the black market and are to give us back half the profit they make. They haven't been doing that. So what I want you three to do, is sneak into the company HQ and get all of the money you can find. Also there is another vault that should have the ryll in it. I want you to bring back about four full bags of that."

Wicket pondered for a moment. "Where is this place? And how do we get in? And are there any guards. And what about these bags, how big are they? Do you hav-" Wicket was cut off.

"Enough with the damn questions!" Frank interrupted. "The HQ is about a couple blocks down from my apartment. I'll mark it on your datapad." He motioned for someone to give him a datapad. Goblin took his out and tossed it at Frank. "Thanks." He fiddled with the screen some. "There it's on here now. And as for guards, There isn't that many. Maybe eight or nine at this hour in the morning. Shouldn't be too difficult, you guys look like you can handle it. Any questions?" Frank looked at Wicket as he was about to open his mouth. "Here." Frank through a couple of laundry bags at Wicket. "There you go. Fill those."

Wicket gathered up the bags and headed out with Goblin and Jag. "So Goblin, where are we headed?"

"Just down this street here then make a left, then make another left at the next street. It's not far, not far at all. Maybe take us ten minutes at tops to get there. I'll lead the way if you don't mind. After all. I do have the directions." Goblin replied.

"No prob." Wicket said.

The group went down the streets following the directions that were given to them. It was still early in the morning so there wasn't much light except those that were coming from some of the street lights that worked. Minutes passed and Jag pointed to a rather tall building. "Is that it?" He asked.

Goblin looked down at the datapad and looked around him. "Yep. I think that's it. Doesn't appear to be anyone standing around outside."

"That's cause they are probably all inside." Wicket said, running to the building. Goblin and Jag started running to catch up with Wicket. They came to a building that was about twenty stories high. It was the tallest building around. "This must be it then." Wicket said admiring the unique structure.

"Dduuuh. I just said that, not one minute ago." Goblin replied shaking his head.

"Oh must not have been paving attention." Wicket said, trying to find a way to get in. "Well how do you suppose we get in this time?"

"I remember one time seeing a building kinda like this and it had a passage on the side of the building that led down to the vaults. I don't remember if it was a dream or not though." Jag said.

"Well, it's worth a try." Wicket replied as he headed to the side of the building. He looked around all over. No one could find the passage that Jag had once claimed to see. "Well let's try the other side." They ran to the other side of the building, but not before stopping. Goblin heard a sound from around the corner.

"Wicket peek your head over and see what it is." Goblin said as he grasped his gun. Wicket took out his gun from one of his pocket's and looked around the corner of the building. Wicket saw a man with what looked to be a security officer suit on. Without thinking, Wicket shot at the man but missed.

"Shit!" Wicket yelled. "I missed. There was a security guard. He running this way now."

Jag jumped in front of Wicket and goblin. He took out his blaster and once he saw the man he pistol whipped him and then did a quick shot to the man. In an instant, the guard dropped to the floor. "Nice." Goblin said. "Look for any kind of keys on him."

Wicket bent down and took the keys that were around his waste. "I guess we can just go through the front entrance." The group went back to the front door. Wicket took the key card and slid it through the lock. The door opened smoothly. Wicket lead the group inside slowly. With everyone watching for guards, it was very quiet. Jag then pointed to a doorway that led to the downstairs.

"I bet it's in here." Jag whispered.

Wicket went over to the door and used the key again. The door opened. "Must be the master key." Wicket whispered back. "Actually this is an elevator." Wicket looked over the buttons and saw one that said BANK. He pushed it. the door closed and the elevator started to move. A few seconds passed and the elevator stopped with a ding. The door opened. The group exited carefully, looking for any one that might be wandering around.

Wicket heard something come from down the hallway. He motioned the way he heard the noise and Goblin and Jag followed. In the distance Wicket could see a figure walking up and down, as if it was patrolling. "Let's just all shoot at it." Wicket said. They all took out their weapons and shot at the moving figure. One of the lasers must have hit because the figure dropped. They continued to walk in that direction.

Suddenly from behind, two guards popped out. "Hey!" They shouted. "You aren't supposed to be down here!"

"The hell we aren't!" Goblin shouted back letting out a few shots from his blaster. One of the guards dropped to the ground. After a few more shots were fired, both guards were dead. "That better be it for now." Goblin said, catching his breath.

"Yeah. Well I see some sort of door at the end of this hallway. Let's see what it is." Wicket said. They continued down the hallway uninterrupted. They reached the door. It had a huge button next to it. "Someone push it."

Jag reached out his hand and extended his finger then pushed the button. The door opened slowly. Once the door opened, in view was a massive mound of credits on the floor. "Wow!" How are we supposed to get all this and the ryll into these bags." Wicket looked down at the bags he was given. "There are five here. Let's fill up three with credits and two with the ryll. What do you think."

"Sounds like we have a plan." Goblin said as he pocketed some of the money laying on the ground. Wicket gave everyone a bag. They all took handfuls of credits and shoved them into the bags. After about ten minutes all the bags were full.

"Good, we got all we can, now let's find the ryll." Jag said.

"Not so fast!" A voice was heard from behind. All of a sudden the door closed.

Readying his E-11, Riq gestured to Alater to bash the door down.  There was a distinguishable “oof” of someone being knocked back from the door, and Riqimo was quick to rush into the building after Alater and quickly employed the autofire of his E-11 on two guards rushing towards them.  Another guard came from his right and Yelsew quickly shot him down.

Riq was surprised at how empty the warehouse was, at least in terms of guards.  Grabbing a few power backs out of one of the crates that Alater had accidentally knocked over, Riq replaced the one in his E-11 and motioned for Alater to stop shifted through a few things and follow him to the administrative area of the warehouse.  The entire building was dimly lit, eerie shadows highlighting each crate, and partially concealing any threat that may be around each corner.  A brightly lit window was ahead, several silhouettes eclipsing the light, and Riq crouched down behind one of the crates and took his E-11 scope off the rifle and zoomed in on the figures.

Whispering slightly, Riqimo gave orders to his team, “We are going to surprise them, hopefully before they can draw weapons or react in any hostile manner.  Alater, you will sneak to below the window, and since your scales will protect you, punch through it when Yelsew and I barge through the main door.  You should be able to intimidate them easily.  Is the plan understood?”

Receiving confirmative nods from them, Riq waved Alater to go ahead, then proceeding with Yelsew a roundabout route to reach the door while crouched behind crates and miscellaneous pieces of equipment.  Once in front of the door, Riqimo checked his E-11 and nodded to Yelsew.  The Squad Leader placed his hand on the door knob and softly counted to three before throwing the door open and aiming his E-11 at the group huddled around the table, almost at the same time, the pane of glass came down in millions of shattered pieces like a sudden downpour of rain, and Alater stood with his toothy grin and his own weapon pointed at the group.

“HANDS UP!  NOW!” Riqimo shouted and the 4 men, half risen from the table, with their hands just barely gripping their blaster pistols froze.  Slowly their fingers opened up from the grip and they raised their hands while standing up completely.

The tallest one spoke first, “What is the meaning of this, officer?”

Riq smirked, “Officer?  This is not a raid by some petty police force, we are here from the Shadows’ Shadows, you cheated them out a few times, and we are simply here to make sure that the next shipment goes through as well as any future ones.”

The man Riq assumed to be Jesep Den blinked twice before nodding slowly, “We will do that, most certainly.”  He glanced nervously at Alater and back to the two humans with rifles trained on him and his colleagues.  Riq saw a soft nod to one of the men and shot the bodyguard as the arms slowly lowered while his neck turned gently towards Riqimo.  Without a second’s hesitation, Riqimo shot the man through the neck and watched the body slump over the table then slide to the ground, the rest of the men became even more tense and raised their hands slightly higher.

“No funny stuff, and consider this a reminder to make sure the Shadows have their requests honored,” firing a carefully aimed shot, Riqimo hit Den’s left wrist, causing the man to clench it with his other hand and pushing the other two to their maximum stiffness.  Making a nod to Yelsew to keep the warehouse managers under the sights of his rifle, Riqimo went to a terminal and plugged the datapad with the required supplies that the Shadows had sent them to pick up.  After a few commands were issued, several droids within the depths of the facility powered up and began to find the requested crates and load them into a truck Riqimo had specified.

Suddenly the comlink on Riq’s belt burst out, "'Ey Doc you there? Doctor...Doc...Riqi...Riq...Riqimo?”

Giving a brief sigh, Riq unclipped it and responded, knowing only one trooper would ever call him up that way, “Yes Wicket?”

“We got two tasks done already, anything else you need us to do?”

“Well, you could just relax a little or see if there is anything else to do.  We should be wrapping up soon ourselves.”

“...in the Den”

Riqimo rolled his neck, working out each little crack until he was in front of the tactical office.  Taking a small sigh, he eased open the door and headed straight for one of the counters.  The woman behind it gave a bright smile, “How may I help you?”

“Eclipse Squad orders please,” Riqimo pushed his indent chit towards her and looked about the room casually while he waited for her to make an identity check and then get the files together.  After perhaps fifteen minutes she slid a small datapad out, “Sign here please.” Riq nodded and took the stylus to certify that he received the items and then tucked his intel datapad into his breast pocket before grabbing a medium sized package and carrying it out under his right arm.

...  ...  ... 

The team changed a bit since the sim they just had been booted out of, for example, their newest recruit was replaced by an even newer one, Isadora.  DarkJedi came out of retirement into Eclipse as well, hopefully bringing some experience to the squad.  We seem to be rounding out nicely as a squad here, niches being filled and everyone getting along... Riq sighed as he saw Jelly trip Wicket as the Sullustan came into the briefing room late, as usual, ... well, mostly getting along.

Now that Wicket was here, Riqimo stood up from the squad briefing table and stepped on the small box he kept near his seat, “Okay, this is real infilteration, not some sim or practice mission.  We will hang around a nice little command ship for a while, first class accommodations.  Then we get to have our little run off and have some real fun.  Coming along for a ride are also some Imperial Center spec ops, who have a mission separate from our own.

“Once inside the station, we are tasked to shut down the hangar, especially the squadrons of E-Wing starfighters and K-Wing bombers.  After that we have various options ahead of us.  During this mission we have uniforms matching those of the shipyard personnel.  I recommend wearing some sort of minor torso armor underneath those in case we get into a firefight.

“Ya’ll have about five hours to get your gear together, grab some food, polish your weapons, or organize your lockers.  We’ll meet in bay seven for a shuttle ride up to the Roland Deschains which is in orbit right now.  Once onboard and settled into our accommodations, I’ll have some more details.”

"Alright guys." Wicket said. "Looks like we still have some time to do at least one more assignment. Goblin, let me see the datapad. We need to find our go-to man."

Goblin handed Wicket his datapad. Wicket scrolled over the datapad making mental notes. [i]This guy is closest to where we are right now. I sopse we could see what he wants us to do. Wicket tossed the datapad back to Goblin. "Alright, This way."

Wiklead the group down an alley way explaining who the man was. "His name is Baark. Light hair, medium height, blah blah blah. There is his place." Wicket pointed to an old building that looks like it had been abandoned fifty years ago.

"You sure he's still alive? Or hell, is this even the right place?" Jag asked.

"Well according to the information Frank gave us..." Wicket looked back down at the datapad. "Err..." Wicket pointed to the building next to it. "That's his apartment."

Jag and Goblin shook their heads. "Wow Wicket. Wow." The group went up to the complex and entered the door. They then headed up the steps to his room.

"Are you SURE this is the room?" Goblin asked.

"Of course. Absolutely positive." Wicket said as he opened the door. The room seemed to be kept in nice condition as if there were a house keeper. They went throw the living room and into the bedroom. A man was sitting on the bed reading a book.

The man looked up. "Uhh, can I help..you?"

"Are you Baark?" Wicket asked.

"Yeah why?" The man replied.

"Yeah Frank said that you might have some tasks for us. Just something small not huge." Wicket explained.

"Yeah I do, but who are you?" Baark said.

"Just some out of work mercs that need something to do. So what you have for us to do?"

"Hmm. Let's see." Baark looks over some papers next to his bed. "No...no...eh maybe...AH! This one is good." Baark reads over the paper. "Yes this is perfect. Not too hard and very simple. All I would need you to do is take a crate of weapons down to this factory and have them pay you for it. Should be about fifty thousand credits. The crate is in the living room next to the davenport. Any questions?"

"Yeah. Where is this factory and how big is the crate?" Goblin asked.

Wicket looked over at Goblin and nodded. "Good question." He said to himself.

"I can put the location in your datapad. And the crate, well you can see how big it is when you go into the living room." Baark said.

"Alright thanks." Goblin said, tossing his datapad to Baark.

Baark entered the information and threw the datapad back at Goblin. "There you go. Don't take too long either."

The group nodded and went into the living room to look for the crate. Sitting next to the davenport, just like Baark said, was sitting a crate about three feet long and two feet tall. "Well this is gunna take two people to carry." Wicket said, glancing at Goblin and Jag. "So you two can carry it while I lead us to this factory."

"Of course we will master." Goblin said sarcastically.

"You don't need to call me master." Wicket said smiling. Jag and Goblin picked up the crate and headed out the door.

------------

Wicket woke up from his dream. He looked over at his clock on the wall and saw he only has twenty minutes left to get ready and meet up with the rest of the squad.He jumped out of bed and hopped into the shower.

Ten minutes later he was gathering his weapons and what not. Wicket took one final look around his room to see if he had forgotten anything. Hmm, nope. He ran out to go down to the shuttle bay. Not five steps later did Wicket go rushing back into his room. My under armor! he frantically searched his room and once he found it, put it on. He had five minutes left to get to the shuttle bay.

------------

Everyone was down at bay seven, except Wicket. "Why can't that boy be on time." Riqimo said.

"He's my team captain isn't he?" Isadora asked.

"Yeah but other than him being late he is a very good kid." Doc replied.

"He can be a bit annoying too. Sometimes he keeps talking and talking and never shuts up." Jelly added.

Wicket came running into the shuttle bay. "I'm here!" Wicket shouted out of breath. "So Doc. I fell asleep cause I was tired. And we had five hours so I thought I had time. Well anyway. So I was dreaming. But it was like I was dreaming as if we were still in the simulator. So the machine must have messed up my brain to make it think I was still in there. Since we stopped the sim so oddly."

"No Wicket, your brain was always messed up." Jelly replied.

"Yeah well..." Wicket tried to think of a come back but couldn't think of one.

"Ok guys enough." Riqimo said. "You aren't showing the new recruits how we should behave. Isadora and Rike looked at each other and shrugged.

"Ah come on Doc. We're only kidding around." Jelly replied.

"Well fine. Just start getting in the right mindset for this mission." Riqimo said.

< Simulation >

Private First Class Isadora Honoratus ducked as the thug swung at her, and she responded in kind with an upper-cut to his midsection.  The rather large, blue skinned Twi'lek let out a WHOOF as the air left his body, and he was stunned for a moment while an armored knee connected with his chin. 

The sound of teeth shattering was loud in the alley, and she glared down at him as he fell to the ground, then stomped him in the ribs once or twice.  She ran a hand across her lip where it was bleeding from a lucky shot he got on her, and spit.  "Next time, asshole, when I tell you to do something, you do it."

She turned and headed to meet up with the rest of the squad when the simulation ended, and she couldn't help but vomit at the sudden radical shift that played hell with her inner-ear and other senses.  Oh that wasn't fun.  Not fun at all.

The rest of the squad, having been seperated by the simulated buildings, stood around waiting for the doors to open, while Gunny Riq dealt with a private delivering a private message.  Heading over, she heard the order for five hours, and groaned.

Five hours to get ready for my first mission.  This sim already is going to have me sore, and now they want more?  I knew it was intense but damn.  Oh well... first order of business is chow.  I'll grab something to eat then head on down to the briefing room after a quick nap and a dab of bacta on my lip.

(( OOC: I'm pressed for time which is why my post is in two parts.  The other part will come when I get home from classes later. ))

After Wicket arrived, the squad was ready to board the ship. Wicket was no longer inexperienced in the Vast Empire. He had been on quite a few missions. Not only for Eclipse Squad but also petty missions that other troopers needed help on. He had gained so much confidence in his fighting abilities.

Wicket entered the ship. There were large seats and tables everywhere. The walls were nice and polished. This is amazing. Never in my life have I seen anything like this. It truly is first class accommodations. I'll have to rearrange my condo when we get back. Wicket thought to himself staring at the interior in awe. He continued to look around the room and saw an amazing chair that looked like it could fit two people. He ran over to it and laid himself down. "This is amazing." Wicket said.

"It sure is." Jelly said from across the room. "Oh my gosh! Wicket come look at this!" Jelly said as he began to back up towards the chair that Wicket was sitting on.

"What is it!?" Wicket asked enthusiastically. He sprang up and ran over to where Jelly was looking. Wicket looked around for about one minute. "I don't see anything...What did you want me to see."

"Nothing. I just wanted to take this seat." Jelly replied, sitting in a relaxed position on the chair that Wicket had previously occupied.

"You bitch." Wicket said. "Riqi! Jelly stole my seat!"

"Wicket...please. Act your age. And besides, just go to the next room and get the futon." Riqimo replied with a grin. Wicket started to run to the next room on the ship. In there was a huge davenport that turned into a bed.

"Thanks Doc!" Wicket shouted.

------------

Wicket had just had just finished taking his nap when there came an announcement over the comm system. WE WILL BE LANDING IN FIFTEEN MINUTES. Wicket arose and gathered his items and went out to meet the other squad mates.

They were all sitting around a table playing a game of cards and sipping on some drinks. "Hey Wick." Everyone said almost together.

"Hey guys!" Wicket said, heading over to the group. He circled the table looking at everyones cards. "Isadora, those are some good cards. Ouch Jelly, doesn't look like you will be winning. Oh Black, looks like Isadora should be watching out for you. Rike, I would just stop playing. No way you can win."

"Wicket! Shut up!" Jelly shouted and punched Wicket in the arm.

Riqimo sighed and shook his head. "Well we needed to finish up anyway. We are landing soon." The group finished up their drink and cleaned up the cards. They all gathered their equipment and waited for the ship to land.

Rike looked at Wicket, always late they said he was and so far he has been. Rike was excited for the mission to come, it would be his first, and hopefully not his last. He Streched, the shuttle ride had been boring. He had ridden a few that were as nice as this if not better, working for the gangs isn't always a dirty job. He picked up his Blaster and realized he had forgot his bayonet, "God damint", he said.


"What is it Rike?" Riqimo, the squad leader, asked him.


"I forgot my bayonet", he paused and laughed, "Lets hope I dont get into a poking fest then." He walked over to the shuttle that would take them to the the station. He was already wearing his new uniform, the one they were using to infiltrate the station.


He walked around the bay, no point in going far if we are leaving soon, Rike thought to himself and spotted the Spec ops team that was going with them for the beginning part of the mission. They were wearing Storm Commando armor and had blaster carbines. Rike had never seen anything that looked as spectacular as that. Rike wanted to join the Spec Ops so badly, it was his type of thing. Focus Rike focus, its mission time, not dream time.


Rike could hear the others in the background laughing and joking, it saddened Rike. Though not the newest member, he still knew like nothing about any of them and found it hard to talk to them. This would be bad on the battlefeild but there wasn't any time, Rike had no idea what command was thinking, they had put 3 new recuirts in literally just before the mission had begin. They all had even missed out on the sim to get prepared for it.


Shuttle is now loading for docking at the station, all going aboard are to go to there seat now. Hearing the call he turned and went with the rest of Eclispe Squad on board. The engines turned on, This is it......

Figures, they never make uniforms my size. Riqimo shuffled through the busy corridors avoiding the various ICS personnel about preparing for the almost immediate docking.  Rolling his shoulders back and composing himself quickly, the squad leader walked into the little room that was reserved last minute.  Seeing Alater, he hissed a little phrase he was taught a few weeks back.

The room was normally used for storage, and had been converted to Eclipse's purposes with a few chairs arranged around the room in a semi circle.  Riqimo stood slightly taller than most of the seated troopers at the center of the semicircle.  He tossed his duffel bag onto a nearby crate and started to go through the mission parameters he had planned out and refined a few hours earlier.

"Okay Eclipse, this is not going to be easy.  Not gonna lie here, you will have to put everything you got into this one.  We do not have any protective armor like our standard stuff, so first off, avoid getting hit.  Secondly, this station may be attacked while we are here.  Extraction is going to be one hell of a ride no doubt.

"Anyways, first thing is our fire teams.  In my team Rike and Jersh.  Jelly will have Blackout and Isadora.  Wicket you pair up with Alater and Saph.  I put some thought into putting these teams together so we can operate at optimal efficiency.

"First off, we leave this ship as a maintenance crew.  Weapons hidden in our duffel bags with some tools and what not.  Once we get out of this ship, we are pretty much on our own.  The ICS commandos will go off on their own, in fact probably are right now.  Our mission objectives have absolutely nothing to do with them.  So don't expect to meet up with them for tea and a little gun fighting.

"Our objective is to lock down the hangar that we are in.  To avoid arousing suspicion, we need to wait until the ship leaves and everyone is supposedly on board going home.  Alpha will be in the uppermost rafters and prepare to slice out most of the network wires.  Beta, you will plant an emp device near each control panel of the starfighters.  Gamma, you are assigned to do a little more brute force, which Alater is perfect for.  I want you to break into a CO's office, get the launch codes for the hangars of the base.

"For those wondering what the hangar is like, let me start by stating it is... well.. pretty huge.  We are a capitol ship docked inside it after all.  There are catwalks that lead around the entire hangar, a few turbolifts to get from one level to another.  The administrative area where the offices are is near the control module from my intel here.  That would be on catwalk level 32 I believe.  Rafters would be above 68.  Gonna be a fun view.  The fighters are in different places.  I do not have specific intel, but they shouldn't be too hard to find.  No doubt that each squadron is in a different general area, with each flight on a separate level.  There are two levels."

Sighing and wishing he had a glass of water, Riqimo pulled at his oversized shirt a little and brushed the pistol that was concealed in a shoulder holster on his left side, "Any last minute questions?"

=======

"Are we in com blackout as well sir?"

"No, we are not, our fequency is well encrypted and I doubt that they are looking for the signals within the hanger itself.  Just to be safe though, keep com chatter to a minimum.

"And another question sir, what is our time-frame here?"

"We have to wait until the Roland Deschains is clear of the area mostly in the meantime we should find our areas and plan out our paths a little better.  Once the actual objectives are underway, we are to hit as fast as possible without drawing attention to ourselves.  Odds are they will be suspecting something if the other squads become a little gung ho in their approaches.  After we are done with those primary objectives we will regroup at a rendezvous  point that is yet to be determined."

Isadora slid the utility belt on, letting it ride crooked on her hip before grabbing a hydrospanner and slipping it into the little loop for it.  Hidden inside the hydrospanner were several small circuit overload units that were spliced into a control panel, then a quick string-pull sent enough juice flowing through the circuits to overload the delicate fuses and circuit breakers inside.

She wore an old gray jumpsuit that had a few oil and grease stains on it, a jacket over it with various patches from construction jobs.  The Quartermaster had been relieved to be rid of the things, and besides it made a hell of a disguise.  Her chocolate colored hair was pulled back in a tail to keep it out of the way, and she put a pair of welding goggles on her head.

Her visage wasn't complete, however, until she made sure of a few other little things, such as making sure her boots looked sufficiently grungy.  A well-worn mechanic wouldn't have perfectly polished boots that was for sure.  She also made sure to get a stick of gum and chew on it, just to give her the look of a fiesty little mechanic.

A fake scar across the base of her neck running from behind her shoulder over to near the front of her neck made her look like she's been in some serious trouble before, and a little coloring over her right eye to make it look like it was healing went a long way.  Anyone who looked at her wouldn't know who the hell she was, even assuming they had her picture on record.

In her duffel bag she stuffed weapons and tools.  A collapsable blaster rifle was easy to conceil since many of it's parts looked like various drill components, and a few other small tools hid her blaster pistol nicely.  She didn't carry grenades, prefering instead the more controlled blast of a breaching charge, which could come in handy later.  A few welding torches finished out her load, and though the bag weighed close to 50 kilos, she easily picked it up and carried it with her.

She stopped on the way to the shuttle to lean close to Jelly, whisper "Stay safe", and kiss him on the cheek before heading to the transport to sit down.  She secured herself in the harness, and once comfortable tried to project calm, almost boredom, as if she were a mechanic who didn't especially want to go back to work again.

Blackout sat with his throwing knives in his hands, he was trembling, ans tiny, but not hardly scene drops of sweat poured down his face. He didn't know what to do, this would be his first mission and he didn't want to mess it up, but he knew somehow he just knew that he was going tomessit up no matter what.

The hardest part though of it all was choosing the weapons, if he didn't choose the right ones he may end up dead, or worse, and he knew by echani trade that a warriors weapns were everything, but he wasn't much a fighter, why he joined the army he never would know, but there was no turning back now. And it was to late anyway to re-choose the weapons, he never understood why he worried so much.


He stood up and the trembling had became to a mere shiver. He slipped the Knives into his jacket and made sure they were well concealed. He threw a few things into his duffel bag that he had taken out during the travel. He stared at the dc-17m that he had concealed in the duffle bag, it was like a cold black curse when anyone saw it they new death was looking at them and calling them home. Blackout had a couple entangles with them and he would never forget them.

He slipped on the belt that was provided for him and was rethinking putting thin knives in there. After a few minutes he did.

He stood there wondering what to do next ,luckily though Riqimo called them all out. Slowly, but surely he went, duffel bag in his hand, how he was going to do this he didn't know, but somehow he had to, somehow he knew he had a job to do, and somehow he was going to do,whether fear or not. Time was against him.