Flight Officer Seth Paven's TIE Fighter screamed through space in formation behind and to the left of his flight leader, Lieutenant Sevros. Their flight was patrolling the edges of the system, on the lookout for pirates, smugglers, rebels, and anyone else the Empire saw as a threat. He sighed and glanced down at his sensors, which showed the area of space around his starfighter to be clear.

He sat back against his pilot's seat and lost himself in thought. He had only been a part of the squadron for a week and a half, he was one of four replacements for pilots that had been killed fighting rebels. One of the other replacements was flying beside him, and the other two were back at base in the flight on standby. He shook his head as the flight turned in a slow arc to cut around a small moon. Just a few months before, he would have been ecstatic to be there, but ever since the news about the death star he had been conflicted as to whether serving in the imperial navy was really what he should be doing. At least Grand Moff Tarkin had died when his toy exploded. No matter what the circumstances, destroying a planet was evil. Seth shook his head banishing the thoughts. He had a mission to focus on.

"Three flight, this is control." A voice suddenly sounded from the com unit.

"Control this three flight, go ahead."

"Sensors detect a ship leaving hyperspace, we want you to do a fly by and report back."

"Will do control, three flight out." He was silent for a second before addressing the flight "All right you heard him, do a flyby and call out anything suspicious."

"Eleven copies." Seth replied.

"Ten. Roger."

"Twelve Confirmed"

The four fighters pulled off to the heading control sent them and they watched as a small freighter exited hyperspace. It wasn't an unusual ship. It had a couple of defense turrets, nothing extravagant. It obviously wasn't designed for bulk freight, it flew slowly in front of them. All in all it wasn't unusual traffic for the system, which was a minor stop for ships to refuel and the crews to rest at the local resorts and hotels on the fourth planet. Yet despite that, Seth felt that there was something wrong with the freighter.

"Keep it tight three flight." The Lt stated as he lead them towards the ship. "I'm going to tell them to power down their engines." Sevros was silent for a moment before the freighter began to slow. The four TIEs shot forward and began a slow loop around the ship scanning it with their short range equipment.

"Sir I'm getting a strange reading coming from their cargo powers, it looks like something powering up." Seth reported.

"I picked up it up too, I'll try to…" The rest of his words were overwhelmed in a hiss of static as a lance of scarlet energy from the freighter caught the Lt's TIE fighter and vaporized its cockpit.

"Break three flight!" Seth shouted and the three pilots scattered to avoid the ships guns as they swiveled around to track them. "Control, scramble the squadron, target is hostile and nine is gone." Even as he spoke the ship's cargo bay opened and two fighters shot out. One was an old Z-95 and the other was an R-41 Starchaser. Seth missed the flight controller's reply as he juked his fighter to starboard, avoiding more fire from the freighter. He pushed forward on his stick diving after the Z-95 with twelve following behind him, leaving ten to deal with the Starchaser. The enemy pilot jerked his fighter around trying to shake Seth, but he managed to keep the aging fighter in his sights and squeezed his trigger sending a stream of emerald lasers burning into its shields. The fighter's shields lit up and held under the violent attack. Then the pilot rolled the fighter and dove away from Seth's fire, he responded by bringing his fighter around in a broad loop before cutting his throttle sharpening the turn before diving after him, ensuring that he stayed behind the enemy. He squeezed his trigger again, sending more green bolts striking into the fighter's shields. This time however, they collapsed and lasers carved their way through its armor and ignited its fuel exploding the fighter and sending debris in all directions.

Seth pulled away from the blast and towards the freighter. Glancing at his sensor board, he activated his com "Twelve, go help ten with the Starchaser, I'm going to make a run at the freighter."

"Copy eleven" Seth's wingmate, the other replacement in the flight, replied and peeled off towards where the other two fighters were locked in a furious dance, each trying to gain an advantage over the other. As he neared the freighter, Seth unleashed another salvo of shots into the shields of the ship and rolled away, avoiding reprisal from its gunners. Red beams sliced through space where his TIE fighter had been just moments before. He knew it was crazy for him to attack the larger ship by himself in a TIE fighter, but if he tried to help engage the R-41, it would just become even more confusing for the pilots and increase the chances of friendly fire which would mean death for the pilots of the unshielded TIEs.

He looped back around and poured even more fire into the ships defenses, continuing to avoid its return fire. He tore his gaze off of the freighter when he heard a scream over the com, he looked at his sensors and saw that ten was gone and the Starchaser was solidly locked in behind twelve. He broke off his run on the freighter and transferred power from his lasers to his engines and rose up behind the Starchaser just as it released a concussion missile. The projectile shot forward and blew straight through twelve's port solar panel before it detonated, shredding the fighter.

Seth opened fire on the Starchaser and trimmed his speed, feeding energy back into his lasers. The R-41's shields flared and its pilot rolled out into a loop to starboard and Seth dropped his throttle to almost nothing and depressed the right rudder pedal, keeping the enemy locked in his sights and pouring an endless stream of green bolts into the fighter's shields. The R-41 rolled to port and dove away from Seth's fire.

He pulled his fighter up and held it for just a second before diving down towards his prey. As the Starchaser appeared in his sights, he saw that his enemy had pulled a tight turn to bring his fighter into a head to head run with Seth. Knowing the shielded fighter had the advantage head to head, he rolled out and away before bringing his fighter back into a dive and flew past his adversary. Damn this guy's good Seth thought as the 41's pilot was already bringing his fighter around to come up behind him. Seth pulled into a loop to the right as the starchaser dropped in on his tail. Before he could get blown apart, Seth cut his throttle and pulled out to the left and trimming his throttle further, he then pulled back onto his original flight path. The starchaser flew past following what would have been Seth's new flight path, allowing him to tuck himself in behind the fighter. Seth locked his sights on the enemy and as soon as they went green, signifying a target lock, he pressed the trigger. The fighter's shields flared then imploded sending sparks flying from its emitters just before Seth's lasers cut the fighter in half.

Seth began to pull around to check on the freighter until there was a bright flash and alarms began sounding in his cockpit. His fighter began spin out of control as his port solar panel ripped off and his fighter began to break up. He reached towards the ejection switch but before he could register whether or not his hand had connected with it, something hit his head and everything went black.