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Corran watched his sensor display as groups of Imperial starfighters launched from not one, but two bases. One was closer to their position by several minutes which might give them time to deal with one wave but not both. The closer formation had several Assault Gunboats as well as Tie Avengers and even some Tie Lancers. Half the numbers of both groups were made up of Tie Interceptors.

The insertion team was supposed to steal or take out of action any Tie Defenders present. So far none of the dangerous craft had shown up but that could change. Already, more advanced Imperial craft were showing themselves. Two Missile Boats and an escort of some newer Tie craft were starting to out pace the slower Interceptors from the farther group.

"Heads up everyone. We're going to punch through the slower group and try to force them to turn in our wake. After that the elites will hit the Missile boats and new Tie craft, everyone else pound those squints to clear us a path back out of here. If the team uses the confusion to escape so much the better."

"This is the Fastblast. We'll cover your escape vector, we just had some Quadlasers installed."

Back toward the converted freighter the squadron of Tie Clutch craft broke off escort of thier carrier and headed after the rebel fighter wing.

The Imperials and Rebels closed to weapons range, the Tie Interceptors hanging back behind the shielded Gunboats and Avengers. Twenty years of fighting off dedicated groups like the rebellion had taught the Empire how wastefull sending unshielded fighters into a head-to-head fight was. Most interception tactics used shielded fighters that could keep pace with the Tie Interceptors speed advantage. Perhaps the insertion team had disabled the Defenders at the very least.

"Concussion Missiles for the first group, save torps for the heavy fighters and base."

The warning tone of a missile lock attempt filled Corran's cockpit. He jinked the new X-wing around spoiling the lock and then switched to Concussion missiles. Corran's R2 unit Whistler made a beeping noise that went solid as the lock-on brackets went red. Pulling the trigger, a single missile went streaking out towards one of the Gunboats. Most of the other X-wings had fired concussion missiles as well and some thirty of them converged on the two leading squadrons of Imperial craft.

Shields failed on fighters from both sides and most of the Tie Avengers winked out along with a couple of older X-wings that had been upgraded. The newer XJ's that had been targeted had used the new forward firing anti-missile flares. It was an expensive and still experimental system but it needed combat data as much as the new fighters did.

The two starfighter groups entered laser range then crashed through each other. Corran triggered a quad burst into a gunboat that had lost shields and watched the cockpit explode back out into space. Switching to dual fire he held down the trigger firing into groups of Interceptors at they passed. As planned none of the X-wings turned to dogfight with the Interceptors forcing the Imperials to split their attention. Just seconds behind the X-wings came Taldira's Deathseeds and the Tie Clutch squadron that was catching up.

Three Tie squadrons continued on toward the remaining Rebels while the remainder turned in persuit.

Corran keyed the com. "What kind of Tie craft are we looking at guarding those missile boats?"

Sei'lar responded first. "Looks like something based off the Avenger, it's... They're Tri-Avengers!"

Corran shook his head. "They're not supposed to be deployed for another year. And even if they were, they should have been in the same base as the Tie Defenders."

Out ahead the two missile boats accelerated for a few seconds using their booster and then fired their heavy missile packs. Four groups of smaller missiles came streaking out.

"Cluster Missiles! Shoot down as many as you can with lasers and hold off using the flares until the last second." A cloud of red laser fire filled the space ahead of the Rebels and the ball explosions associated with concussion missiles appeared when the laser fire burned through the missile armour coating. The Missile Boats fired another spread of missiles as the last of the first wave were shot down, then they dropped back to cover the Tri-Avengers.

The tie craft added their own missile fire to the volley.

This time the Rebels went straight to using flares on the incoming missiles. Three X-wings instantly exploded, all hit by multiple missiles. As they reached laser range the new Ties all changed course and accelerated in diffrient directions.

"Break by pairs. First and second flight hit those Missile Boats."

The Imperials were trying to seperate the Rebels, reducing their strength and buying time for support to arrive. As his flight closed on one of the fast moving Missile Boats he glanced at the sensors. They had less than five minutes until the ties from the scond base arrived and seconds until the survivors of the first wave caught up. Knowing they didn't have time now Corran switched over to his Torpedo launcher. It took slightly longer to get a lock than with the newer concussion missiles but the reticle still turned red.

The blue tailed projectile shot out as the other fighters in his flight opened fire with lasers. The shots struck at the same time droping the shields of one fighter. A quad burst burned through it's wing before the pilot could activate the heavy engine booster. Then the heavily pockmarked fighter accelerated away from the fight. The other missile boat dropped in behind first flight and fired Cluster missiles again.

"BreakBreak!"

All eight of Corran's remaing aft flares fired as he and the others of his flight rolled out, ball explosions appearing just tens of meters behind his fighter. The Missile Boat stayed with him attempting a torpedo lock next. Just as with his own weapons the torpedoes took longer to lock giving him enough time to swing around for a head to head with Two Flight. Opening himself fully to the force, something he didn't like to do in combat, he waited for the tell-tale signs that the Boat pilot was going to fire.

His hand jinked the controls causing a pair of torpedoes to go shooting past him rather than into the tail of his fighter. Four quad linked shots took the Imperial fighter in the bow at the same time, overpowering the shields and burning out it's cockpit. The Torps which had started to loop around to re-aquire their target, exploded, hit by laser fire from One flight.

The Interceptors and a few Tie Avengers from the first wave started to arrive at the dogfight between the X-wings and Tri-Avengers.

"Let's get those Ties before the Second wave get's here."

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