The Dark Jedi had barely enough time to croch behind a steel barrel whhen the MTD detonated; flashs of light and molten metal spiraled everywhere, embedding into the wall and detonating chemical packs that had labels such as 'warning: flammable'

Alarms blaring; the Jedi finally regained his senses and rushed toward the door only to find it wouldn't open. "Must've jammed it some-how.." he said and took out his lightsabre which was, surprising, in one piece. He ignited the angry red blade and thrusted it into the door to make an opening, now he wondered how much time it would take him.

Hanger bay

Marine's rushed across the deck as the alarms sounded; an explosion had been reported on deck fourteen, aft supply room. As the soldiers boarded the elevator, mechanics just went about their daily work of repairing and refitting ships had docked in this bay.

One of the mechanics glanced about as he yanked out the security cut off switch in a Sparrow Reten Fighter, the switch allowed flight control to severe the link between the power plant and the fighter, rendering it inoperable. "Monik better be right that this 'Trandoshan' will need a ride... lets just hope they come down to his bay or else they'll find themselves trapped." The mechanic said and went back to prepping the fighter.

The pain in her shoulder was getting worse, especially when she was standing still as she was now in the elevator. Reaching back, she felt the wound, though she couldn’t tell much since she was still wearing the armor. Damn armor must be specced for only blasters, not slug throwers. She thought with a painful groan as she flexed the wounded limb. I don’t feel anything ‘wrong’, like a broken bone or something, besides the blood that is. Even then, she didn’t seem to be bleeding much: whatever bleeding she had seemed to have stopped already. So she was genuinely puzzled as to why she was in so much pain right now. I hope it doesn’t get much worse…. She thought. I still have to fly out of here.

***

A group of soldiers were waiting for the elevator to arrive, wondering what was taking it so long. This was the closest elevator to them and they new the fate would have the elevator arrive should they leave to head to the next closest one, so they stayed put. As they watched the deck indicator though, they saw something puzzling: the elevator went right pass their floor and stopped on the hanger deck. They may be only soldiers, but they quickly realized what that had to mean. So when the elevator finally came back up and stopped on their floor they rushed in and intended to go down to the deck level. There was one problem though…

Someone had ripped up the control panel inside the elevator itself, leaving them unable to tell it where they wanted to go. Looked like they were taking the other elevator after all….

***

She was finally on the hanger deck and so far luck was with her as she hadn’t run into any soldiers: the way her shoulder was acting up she wasn’t sure she could fight them any more if she did. Now…the biggest problem was this: Lavality never told her which hanger it was that Crescent fighter was supposed to be in and she didn’t have a lot of time to find it….

The hanger bay was a bustle of activity; mechanics now ran from one point to another, moving supply crates and vehicles off the deck. Pilots engaged their fighters and began to move them into smaller bays so they would get out of the way, all of the movement had the pin marks of an arriving shuttle.

A mechanic had spotted a female Trandoshan leaving the elevator, but he hadn't raised the alarm, instead he moved slowly and quietly, making it seem like he was just going to do more work. Once at the supply crate he delt down and began to fiddle with the numbers, he knew the Trandoshan was hiding somewhere behind him, amongst the various crates, but he didn't know 'where' exactly.

He did a brief look around before speaking. "Small bay to my left, go two down, you'll find a Crescent Reten fighter charged up and ready to fly. Just plot a course and allow the onboard AI to take over, don't worry about being pursued," the mechanic said as he glanced about once more.

"Who are you talking to?" A security officer said who had just walked into the area, the mechanic turned around to find that it was Monik. "Damn it.. don't scare me like that.. thought it was one of their men."

"Nope, most of the traitors have been delt with. A few of them have locked themselves in their quarters but will be delt with accordingly." Monik said and turned his attention to the elevator; a second later the door were blown off and three marines went flying toward the far side of that part of the bay.

Monik crouched down behind the supply crate; as the smoke cleared a Dark Jedi came out of the now destroyed elevator. "What the hell..." Monik said and peeked over his cover and began to fire on the jedi, all his rounds were reflected off the light sabre.

"Whoever else is hiding here, get your ass in gear and move! We'll cover you!" Monik shouted as he primed a granade and threw it over his cover and toward the Dark Jedi.

She was starting to feel even worse now, though it wasn’t due to pain this time: that had leveled off. Now weakness was threatening to stop her from going anywhere else and when she was so close to escaping. Hiding behind a bunch of crates, she gathered all her will and strength to keep the weakness and pain at bay. Once she felt he had beaten it back enough she risked a look around, but saw nothing that had to be the Crescent fighter Lavality told her about.

Where do I go? She thought, despair starting to set in. If she didn’t find that fighter soon she would eventually be overwhelmed by whatever was wrong with her. Asri was beginning to fear sh would die on this station, when suddenly a god send occurred.

"Small bay to my left, go two down, you'll find a Crescent Reten fighter charged up and ready to fly. Just plot a course and allow the onboard AI to take over, don't worry about being pursued," A mechanic from the other side of the crates said. Must be one of Lavality’s contacts. She thought gratefully, looking from behind the crates to spot the bay the man pointed out.

She found herself hesitating, partly due to the security officer that had just walked up and started talking to the mechanic, whom had to be another one of Lavality’s contacts, and partly due to fear that she wouldn’t make it. Already, despite her resolve, she felt the pain and weakness starting to come back.

Then she heard a explosion behind her and a glance back revealed to her horror the Dark Jedi she had locked away emerging from the now destroyed elevator. Mental note: it takes more then an MTD to take out a Jedi…. She thought to herself as the security officer yelled at her to get moving.

So she started running toward the bay she was told about, hoping her new found allies could keep the Jedi busy enough for her to escape. In her heart though she knew they stood even less chance against it as she did. There were only two people she knew that could defeat that man: Lavality and Trazu.

Lavality sighed as she watched the mission counter. "Fifteen minutes.." she said as she rubbed her left shoulder; she was feeling pain for some odd reason. "Guess I over worked by shoulder.." she said.

"Ma'am, we just got a report from the base, it's from LT. Monik." The communications officer said as he piped the report over to her command chair; the report came up in an encrypted form, it only took her computer a few seconds to decrypt it. She scrolled down the report, she liked what she was seeing. "Well now, much of our problems have been solved," she said to herself.

The communications officer was still listening to the comm. lines when he received a recall order. "Ma'am, theres a recall order in progress. It seems a revolt of some type of occuring on the station."

"A revolt? Huh.. the station commander seems to over-react to every little thing. Ok fine, in form him that our fleet is responding to his distress call and we'll be there shortly." She grinned, when the message was sent, another came several seconds later informing them that they had everything under control, which was contridictory to the fact that the station was still sending out the recall order on all Seren channels.

"Proceed to the base," Lavality ordered. "Prep a Crescent Reten fighter for AI Flight,"

"Ma'am?"

"Asri will most likely use that type of a fighter, its the easiest to handle and has an onboard AI computer that will fly it for her, but in any event, when we arrive we'll need to take it out - naturally since it'll be flagged as an enemy fighter, so we'll release the decoy fighter and, while she is docking, we'll destroy the decoy and leave trace amount of female Trandoshan DNA."

Her officers liked the idea, even more so now that they most of the disruptive elements have been removed. "Ma'am, just got a priority message from Monik, was sent just a minute ago via an admirals channel. We have a Dark Jedi on base, in the hanger bay, engaging our forces."

"A Dark Jedi? Impossible..." Lavality said while walking over to the comm. panel, sure enough an image of man wearing a darkened robe with a light sabre appeared. "Ok so that is a Dark Jedi; but who the hell allowed a Dark Jedi on board?"

"No clue ma'am, but if this is true, then our plans are in jeopardy. Prep a gunship for take off, load up several torpedos and get me four sharp shooters to control the turrets." Lavality ordered as she left the bridge

Headquarters, Hanger Bay

Monik hid behind several crates, but his cover was disappearing fast as the Dark Jedi was using the blaster fire to worn away everyone's cover. He bolted from spot and into a smaller bay, it was useless firing at him since it wasn't causing any damage - what it was doing was slowing him down.

"Keep firing!" Monik ordered through the squad comm's.

Asri was running as fast as she could, but with her strength failing her pace kept gettng slower and slower. At one point, just as the bay the security officer told her about came into sight, she tripped and fell. As she tried to pull herself back up to her feet, her arms and legs shook violently before giving out on her again.

No....so close.... She thought, tears welling in her eyes. Trazu...I'm sorry...I....NO! I won't let it end like this...not alone...not alone! I don't want to be alone! She recalled her times with Trazu and the kids, reminding herself how much they needed her. With that strengthening her resolve, she slowly and weakly rose to her feet again and staggered into the bay where the Crescent Fighter loamed before her, beckoning for her to enter it.

Behind her some where the sound of fighting seemed to grow more intense, but she couldn't be sure if that was her imagination or not. With each step she was taking requiring every ounce of her will she forced herself to ignore the fighting and get herself to the fighter. Yet every step she took seemed to get heavier and heavier, until finally she reached the fighter's port side. Using it's hull as support, she inched her way painfully toward the cockpit....

A marine screamed when the Dark Jedi's light sabre severed his arm from his body, sending the limb flayling in the air and landing with a 'thud' on the ground.

Monik chose this point to come out his hiding spot and tossed two granades, which the Dark Jedi just motioned his hand and caused both nades to fly harmessly to his right.

He snarled. "Bastard...." Monik said and hefted his repeater and opened up.

As he fired he took several steps back; but the Dark Jedi just kept going, using his light sabre to block and deflect most of the shots.

Finally his repeater over-heated; belching smoke from several vents. He snarled and tossed the burned out weapon onto the ground and took out a carbontis katana and began to engage the Dark Jed in a duel, all he had to do was buy their guest a little more time.

Outside the station

Several check points had now been cleared as a gunship flew past several asteroids with weapon emplacements built into them; some distance behind the gunship it's command ship went in via another path, one used by ships larger than a frigate class.

"Gunners at your station!" The pilot aboard the gunship shouted.

Just as Asri reached the ladder to the cockpit she spotted the two ships in space heading toward the station. One she recongized as a gunship, but the other was still too far away to make any form of identification. Guess my forty minutes are up.... She thought with a chuckle, thinking of no other reason why Lavality's forced would be coming in now.

When she started to climb the ladder, she nearly blacked out due to a shot of pain in her injured shoulder, a cry of pain escaping from her lips. She was forced to stop a moment for the pain to subside again. Guess I can't use this arm anymore....until I have a medic look at it. She thought, wondering how she was going to climb the ladder in her weakened state.

With no other option, she hooked her good arm around a rung, then stepped up onto a lower run with her feet. Using her teeth, she secured her balance by biting on the rung above the one her arm was hooked on and only then did she unhook her arm and rehooked it onto a higher rung and repeat the process. It took much longer then it would have normally, but she finally got into the cockpit....

The battle had intensified; a full on revolt was now in progress on the station. Security officers loyal ot Lavality, and those loyal to Miknak, fought it out on various decks.

In the hanger bay the battle had also gotten worse - the Dark Jedi wasn't moving much, but he was making life difficult on the security detail that had arrived.

For Monik, things were getting worse. "The station is in an uproar, civilian sectors have been sealed off but the fighting is just getting worse." He heard an officer shout over the blaze of blaster fire.

Suddenly the doors to the hanger bay began to close; Monik turned and noticed that there was a lot of activity in the conning tower. "Shit.." he said and was about to bolt for the conning tower when something unexpected happened.

As the doors were about to close shut; they edges began to turn orange, then red, then hot white, then a second later they blew apart, spewing hot molten steel across the bay, several of those peices impacts into the Dark Jedi, he was able to only reflect a few of them but wasn't able to get to a larger peice which slammed him into a wall, bones crushed under the weight.

Outside in space a gunship loamed just behind the force field; the ship, roughly twice as long as a typical fighter, ignited it's engines and moved through the force field and into the bay. Everyone had stopped fighting and wondered who's side the gunship's crew were on, the answer came when the Dark Jedi forced the debris off of him and tried to grab the gunship with the force.

Four of the six turrets on board suddenly came about and released a volley of blaster fire into the Dark Jedi, pulverizing his robe and pelting him into nothing more than a burnt cinder.

The Gunship moved deeper into the bay; now that it's alliegence had been verified, those loyal to Miknak opened fire on it, but the attack was futile as the gunships crew turned their attention to those who were firing it. The vessel then moved up to the two only entrances to the bay, covering them.

On board, Lavality looked around. Where the hell is Asri.... I didn't even see a fighter leave... she could sense Asri, but she couldn't tell 'where' exactly she was.

Meanwhile, outside in space, a Crescent Reten fighter, with only a cloaking drive and an AI core and the basic equipment needed, remained cloaked until the escape fighter was to appear.

Asri was forced to rest a moment: climbing that ladder had sapped much of what was left of her strength. Then she got to work on detaching the ladder she used to climb up, which was awkward since the ladder was on the left side of the ship and she could only use one hand. She was vaguely aware of the sudden increase of intensity of the fighting in the hanger near by and then the sudden decrease. That gun ship must have finally arrived. She thought as she finally worked the ladder loose, sending it crashing down to the bay floor with a loud clang.

Now she could close the cockpit and get the engines started. While the systems were coming online, she found the helmet under the seat and put it on, then strapped herself in as best she could with one hand. At least I should be able to fly with one hand…. She thought as she did a quick look around the control panels to verify what buttons and levers did what. Where to go…that man said all I had to do was put in coordinates, but I don’t have any coordinates to give it….

Looking out the bay and into space, she saw the larger ship was even closer now. Is that the ‘Star Nova’? She thought, remembering only vaguely what the flag ship looked like from the flight she had with Lavality earlier. I hope it is…cause I’m heading for it. She gunned the engines and the Crescent fighter shot out of the bay. The force of the departure jammed her shoulder into the seat, causing a wave of pain and nearly making her black out. Asri regained her senses just in time to narrowly evade a large asteroid.

Goddess…I hope no one was watching…I look like a novice…wait…I am. Asri thought as she guided the fighter toward the large ship that was making it’s way toward the station. Half way there Asri felt herself starting to fade again, only this time no amount of will power was helping. Realizing she needed to get to medical on the ship, she pushed the fighter to it’s limits as she sped toward the larger ship. When she was within hailing range she turned on the comm.

“Star Nova, this is Asri!” She said, her voice strained. “I need clearance to land immediately! Get….” She had to fight off a wave of dizziness for a moment. “Get medical ready!”