The clouds whipped past the wily Jedi, as he inclined his body slightly, slowing his descent. To his left, he saw the green burst of light that was Zeb's flare, and to his right, a red one. He steered slightly to the side, avoiding a collision with Sabine, and continued falling. Truth be told, he wasn't sure about this plan. It had been dreamed up in a hurry, and relied much on luck. That, and the imperials underestimation, as they were essentially going in blind. The HUD on his Night Ops Armour told him he should be free of the clouds by now, but they were still there, all around him. Just as he began to puzzle over this, he burst through the clouds, and, once he took a look at the base, realised they had made a big mistake.

It wasn't a base. It was a fortress.

As soon as Sabine exited the clouds, she got a glimpse of the base, and her heart skipped several beats.

The comm was suddenly bursting with chatter, as Sabine and Zeb radioed in with concerns.

"Look at the size of that thing!"

"We can't do this! It's too big!"

"We have to, it's the planet's only hope!"

"We'll never survive down there! Abort, ABORT!"

"Quiet! We're passing through the shield soon. Expect static disorder. Once were in the shield, we won't be able to contact each other. It's to late to abort now! We can do this!"

Sabine had been about to comment on their leaders sanity, but at that moment, she felt a weird feeling, like when you poke your finger inside a bubble. She was inside the shield, and now, the only thing for it was to complete the mission.

It would be what Ezra would have wanted.

Sabine twisted in mid air, and activated her jetpack. Slowly cruising to a halt, she landed on top of the surveillance tower. Detaching herself from the bulky machinery, she slowly slipped down, off the roof, and into the control deck of the tower. Luck ran her way. There was one stormtrooper on guard, and he evidently wasn't one of their best men. He was fast asleep, leaning against his Vibrostaff. His helmet was at his feet, and the mans expression hardly changed as Sabine grabbed his blaster from the console and whacked him over the head with it. He simply grunted, slid off his chair and on to the floor and continued snoring. Sabine crossed to the console, and took control of the spotlight. Looking through her viewpoints, she saw Kanan land just outside the Security Monitoring Center, and Zeb just inside the outer wall. Sabine sighed.

It had begun.

Kanans landing went off without a hitch. He touched down just outside the camera range, and waited. When he saw the camera move slightly to one side, he took his chance, knowing Sabine had completed her first objective. Moving to the window, he slowly took out his Laser Cutter, and watched as it silently cut a perfect hole in the window. Kanan slipped inside, and inched carefully to the two officers who were on duty, watching the camera. Two muffled sounds echoed throughout the room.

*thump*

*thwack*

Kanan lay the two unconscious troopers out in the room, and crossed to the monitoring board. Moving behind it, he pulled out his lightsaber, and promptly sliced through all the wires connecting the cameras, and the screens one by one fizzled out. He then sent the morse code radio signal to Zeb, and moved towards one of the troopers, ready for his next objective.

Deep inside the catacombs of the base, in the centremost room, a stormtrooper nervously approached his quarry, a mysterious, frail-looking woman concealed in a cloak. Her head was covered by a hood, and she spoke with a rasping voice, one that sent shivers down the stormtroopers spine.

"What is it, Commander?"

"We intercepted an unauthorised transmission from inside the base, but we suspect it was just a faulty program."

He switched on his datapad, and a high pitched noise filled the room. A beep, followed by a long silence, and then another beep. The woman smiled.

"Good. It seems our rebel friends have come to stop us."

"Orders, mistress?"

"Spread out your squad, and draw them back here. I want them to see their hope… Go up in… A Vortex. Hahahahaha!"

Zeb was waiting just outside the sight of the snipers, when he got the morse code from Kanan. Smiling, he slipped past the deactivated cameras, and reached the door. After inspecting it, he concluded that it was a triple-reinforced, steel-locked durasteel door, with a code lock.

'Child's play.' Thought Zeb, as he stuck his hands into the little crack between the doors, and began to slowly pry them apart. After a delay, they opened, and he slipped himself into the base inner interior. He slowly crept through the corridors, leaving a trail of stormtroopers with dented helmets in his wake.

Sabine sat in the chair, her heart racing as she tried to catch up to what was happening. There were times when she questioned what she was doing, and now was another of them. Hiding her head in her hands, she tried to find reason. She asked herself, 'what would Ezra say now?' It was a ground, a standard by which all things were judged.

At first, nothing happened, but eventually, the voice came, as it always did.

"You take care of the others, Sabine. That's all I can say. And take care of yourself too."

Sabine opened her eyes.

"Thank you, Ezra." She whispered.

Her patience was rewarded when, with a static fizzle, the cameras one by one went out. She slipped out of her chair, and took the turbolift down below ground level. For safety reasons, the base had been installed with a network of catacombs under the main base, which served as emergency exits and ways of getting around the base. Now, it was time to make full use of those catacombs. She slipped into the shadows of the underground tunnels, and kept creeping along.

The layout was set. All three had infiltrated the base, in their own way. The plan from there was simple: meet up, find the superweapon, and destroy it.

Zeb was sprinting down the corridor, when he ran into a stormtrooper. This one, however, yelled:

"Zeb! There you are, what's wrong?"

Zeb pointed over his shoulder, and the trooper turned on his metallic heels and ran side by side with the Lasat. They saw the grate move ahead of them, and in one fluid movement, Zeb stooped, and plucked a female Mandalorian out of the duct without even stopping. All three of them ran, until the trooper led them down a side corridor, and they narrowly avoided getting fried by the electric wall moving up behind them.

Once they were free, the trooper pulled off his helmet, and Kanan exclaimed,

"Stang, this thing is hot! Sabine, how did you guys stand this suit? I'm boiling!"

"Well, that must be why we rebelled then, huh?" Snapped the Mandalorian. "Bad coolant systems in the suits!"

"Wait, these things have coolant systems? Whe-"

"The knob on the side of your helmet. Honestly Kanan, pull yourself together, have you even noticed where we are?"

"Hmm, let me guess," exclaimed Zeb. "The Festival Of Hearts, perhaps?"

All three of the rebels laughed, and then Kanan became suddenly stern again.

"Come on, this way."

The Superweapon expelled so much power out of it, that it had had to be given its own coolant tanks to keep it stable. This thoroughly annoyed the engineers of this terrifying new weapon, as it had resulted in several more months of work, and considerably more fatalities. As it happened, at the time there were an above average amount of troopers in the room, along with the mysterious assassin the emperor himself had commissioned on the project. To tell you the truth, no one exactly knew what made this woman so special, but they had learnt not to question her authority.

Not after what happened with Alpha Survey Team.

As the troopers pondered this, the door to the room was thrown clean off its repulsors, but this time, it literally flew across the room, out of the doorway and hitting two troopers right off their feet, as three figures ran into the room.

"It's over, imperial scum. We are here to destroy this weapon of yours. Stand aside now, or die."

The woman smiled, and raised her hands in mock surrender.

"Oh dear, what am I to do?" She exclaimed, and then:

"Welcome to Omega Base, home of the infamous Project Vortex. You know what it does. Or rather, you think you do."

As if in a play, at that exact moment the lights behind her flickered on, revealing the terrifying sight before them.

A huge machine stood behind the woman, a ginormous technological terror. Strangely enough though, it looked just like a…

"Mining drill?" Exclaimed Kanan. "This is your ultimate weapon? A glorified drill?"

"Ahh yes, partly Kanan, partly, it is a mining drill. But we have far better uses for it." The woman smiled.

"You see, as we speak, Project Vortex is drilling right down to the planet's core. Once it reaches it, a specialised system inject the core with a highly explosive liquid, common in explosives and charge weapons alike."

"Using our specially tuned equipment, we arm that liquid, and consequently turn the entire planet into a giant, flying, BOMB."

The rebels froze, their faces each a mask of pure horror.

"Yes, once it's armed, we abandon the planet, and after manoeuvring it into position, we press a button and POOF! Whole system gets wiped off the starmaps! Hahahahaha! You were wrong Kanan. This weapon won't destroy a planet. It will destroy a SYSTEM!"

At once, the room was filled with thousands of laser bolts, as Kanan, Sabine, and Zeb dived for cover, and felled two stormtroopers each, leaving six in the room. This still outnumbered the rebels two to one, or at least, it did.

Suddenly, a loud scream ran out, and both sides stopped fire as a stormtrooper ran into the room. His gun and helmet were gone, and he looked utterly terrified.

"Sir! We're under attack! We were just out there and now they're everywhere! Someone's bringing all hell down upon us sir! And, he's here, HE'S HERE! IT'S THE- URGGH!"

At once, a bright blue laser bolt sailed through the air, and the stormtrooper flipped into the air and crashed to the floor, coming to an abrupt stop on the wall.

Silence descended on the bay, only broken as, with a yell, another terror rushed the room.