The Admiral looked up.
"The Alliance treasury doesn't have this much money!" he said gritting his teeth.
"You said, 'this mission could make or break the Alliance'!" Madine said in a very accusatory tone. "And when I asked you if you wanted me to load the freighters, that my men were going in on, what did you say?!" he asked, his irritation transforming into anger very quickly.
"I didn't ask you to bankrupt the Alliance," Ackbar said, his voice on the verge of yelling.
"Listen Admiral, this stupid mission was your idea to begin with. Now I'm wasting 60 of my best men, on a suicide mission, and you're complaining about how much I spent on explosives!" Madine hollered; his face was now turning red. "You don't like it, call it off! We'll give the damn explosives back!" Madine continued, his face now going to a crimson color.
Ackbar stood up and came around his desk.
He held his data pad in Madine's face, "you see that!" he yelled, pointing to a figure on the screen. "We don't have that much money; don't you get it?!" Ackbar continued.
"Then tell Mon Mothma to sell some bonds! I'm a General, not a freakin accountant!" Madine retorted. "You asked me to plan this, you asked me to plan the Belran mission, you asked me to plan the Endor mission- do you ever say thank you. All you do is complain; if you don't like the way I do my job, then find someone else to do it!"
"And what a good job you did at Endor," Ackbar replied, out of pure anger.
It was a nasty pot shot. Amazingly the General's face became a darker red than it already was, a sort of maroon color. His yelling now was coming from deep in his chest.
"I didn't get that code, the Bothans did! Never have I sent my men in with a bad code that I got, never. They knew we were coming anyway." He continued, fists now clenched.
Ackbar stepped back and sat on the front of his desk. He put his big head into his fin and took a deep breath. He knew that the ground mission at Endor wasn't Madine's fault. The Admiral looked up at the bearded man in front of him. In a calm voice, well, as calm as could be expected under the circumstances, he started to talk. His voice sounded more raspy than usual, from yelling. It was a tough transition for his vocal cords, going from 110 decibels down to something more normal.
"Why is it… that we couldn't use cheaper explosives?" he asked, as diplomatically as possible.
Madine took a deep breath. He sat down on the couch.
"Anything over a couple of…" Madine's voice started to give out, and he cleared his throat. "Anything over a couple of hundred kilotons would easily be detected; unless it is packaged right. Anything smaller than that would cause little damage to that ship-outside of the docking bay where it was detonated.
The Goss have a way of packaging these things so that they block the signature of the proton cluster. I tried to call you before I bought them, but your comm was off, and you said you wanted the mission to launch as soon as possible."
Ackbar sat back down in his chair, feeling a bit guilty for yelling at the General.
"Thank you for putting this mission together, General," he finally said.
"You're welcome," Madine said, as he got up.
He paused for a moment as if to say something, but then just walked out, not knowing what to say. Now Ackbar would have to explain this to Mon mothma. He grabbed his stuff and headed for her office. When he got there, Ackbar was told that she was in the boardroom. When he arrived at the boardroom, there were several high-ranking officers sitting outside. Their uniforms were not those of his navy, though.
"You must be Admiral Ackbar," one being said, walking up and extending a limb in greeting. "I'm Admiral Sing, of the Feegian Alliance, it's a pleasure to meet you."
"Likewise, Admiral," Admiral Ackbar said.
He had completely forgotten that they were having foreign dignitaries on board. Apparently, the dignitaries also brought their top brass with them.
"Where are the politicians?" Ackbar asked his new acquaintance.
"They're inside; doing they're thing," Admiral Sing answered.
"I'm Admiral Goosen," another man said, shaking Ackbar's fin.
"Goosen, you have the Sorican Navy, right?" Ackbar asked, recognizing the name.
"That's right," Admiral Goosen replied. Ackbar introduced himself to the rest of the officers, most of them Admirals commanding navies for their respective nations, or groups of nations. Each here because their leaders were considering joining the Alliance.
"Admiral Sing, your fleet has a Star Destroyer, doesn't it?" Ackbar asked, as he remembered who the Feegians were.
"Yes. We have one Victory-class, and four Venator-class Star Destroyers," Sing responded.
"Venator-class?" Ackbar repeated, as this type did not immediately ring a bell.
"They're uh… Old Republic assault ships," Sing answered.
"Oh, ok. That's right," Ackbar said, understanding.
"Yeah, most people just call them Republic assault ships. Whenever I say Venator-class, people are like what," Sing said.
"I saw you guys have something called a Centillian, what's that?" Ackbar asked.
"Those are frigates, they have seven turbolasers and 19 ion cannon. We use them for boarding ships," Sing explained.
"Do they run well, as far as maintenance and what not?" Ackbar asked, making casual conversation, and out of interest.
"Yeah, no problems so far, and one of them's been in service for about seven years now; the other one was commissioned about two years ago," Sing answered.
"Interesting. We have one like that, but we went the other route. We just put one big ion cannon on the front of it. Shipyard says they're not sure how mechanically sound it is," Ackbar said.
"Hmm, I've never heard of it," Sing said.
"Well, we just commissioned her. The only reason I'm telling you is that her first mission should be completed by now, so the Empire probably already knows about her," Ackbar confided.
Just that moment Mon mothma came out of the boardroom. "Will all of you gentlemen come in please," she said.
Admiral Ackbar walked over to her, "I need to speak with you when this is over Mon Mothma."
"Alright Admiral, we'll talk. Please come in."
There were dignitaries from nine different groups in the room. After the first battle of Endor, so many wanted to join the Alliance that Mon mothma simply could not meet with them one at a time. Instead she would schedule five or ten at a time, sometimes more. Once the officers were in, she explained that three groups would join the Alliance. The bad news was that the largest ship that they would contribute was a single Escort Frigate.
"The rest of the nations, except for the Wickers, have pledged their support, but are not ready to join just yet," Mon mothma explained.
"Admiral Ackbar is the head of the Alliance navy; Admiral, would you care to say anything?" she asked, gesturing toward him.
"I'd like to thank you all for pledging your support. I'm sure our people will talk to your people, but there are a few things that we really need now," Ackbar said.
Ackbar didn't usually bring things up at these initial meetings, but it wasn't completely unheard of.
"I had hoped that the Soricans and Feegians would join…" Ackbar was interrupted by the Feegian ambassador.
"…We're actually very close to a deal Admiral. We came to an agreement with Mon mothma. As soon as you retake Endor, we will join. In the meantime, if there is anything you need, you have our support," the ambassador said.
"Well, I'm glad you said that, ambassador, because I could really use the support of your fleet in retaking Endor," Ackbar said.
"Admiral, even with our ships, the fleet at Endor would still be nearly twice our size, how will you defeat such odds?" the ambassador asked.
"Naturally I cannot discuss the strategy for an upcoming offensive in public. However, ambassador, once I know that I have your support, you and I can sit down in private, and I will go over my plans in detail."
"Due to the lack of information, I cannot place my fleet under your command. However, here is what I can do. I will authorize our fleet to join in the attack, so long as Admiral Sing agrees with your plan; but, our fleet will be under his command."
"Mr. Ambassador, I thank you for your generosity, however, with respect Sir, it is very difficult to conduct a battle with two commanders."
"That's the best I can do right now Admiral."
Ackbar decided to give it one more try, "Sir, there have been numerous instances in military history…"
Mon mothma cut him off this time. "Ambassador Mandel, will the Sorican fleet also join in the assault?" she asked.
"I cannot authorize that at this time," was the reply.
"Can you participate in any way?" she pushed.
Admiral Goosen and Ambassador Mandel whispered to one another. Then Goosen turned to Ackbar, "Admiral, what if we launched a diversionary attack somewhere else," he asked.
"I suppose that would help, can I pick the target?" Ackbar asked.
More whispering between Goosen and Mandel, finally Mandel turned to Ackbar, "How about if we come to an agreement after this is over?" he suggested.
"That sounds fair," Mon mothma said, cutting in; again, wanting to keep Ackbar from arguing.
"Admiral, what was the other thing that you wanted to discuss," she asked.
"We need money. I just got a bill for 140 billion, for some critical supplies that we received."
Mon mothma's heart skipped a beat. It was obvious to everyone that she was as shocked as they were.
Ackbar continued, "We need to get repair shuttles here, and I mean dozens of them," he said.
"Is this what you had wanted to talk to me about, Admiral?" Mon mothma asked, her face as expressionless as Lando Calrisian at a card table.
Ackbar nodded.
Ambassador Dav Wright, representing one of the three groups who had agreed to join the Alliance, spoke first.
"The Mes Alliance is prepared to put up 50 billion," Wright said.
"That's very generous of you," Mon Mothma said. This was shocking too, luckily, she already had her sabaac face on.
"I will also see if we can send a few of our repair shuttles," Wright added.
The Mes did not have much to contribute in the way of ships or ground forces. In fact, the Feegians and Soricans were the only two groups at this table who did. Mon Mothma figured that his government had already authorized this money as a contribution, and this just happened to be a good time to mention it. Another group offered 15 billion, and some offered free services from their repair shuttles and shipyards, this still only covered about half of the money Ackbar needed for the explosives, not to mention the tens of billions needed for more repair shuttles to come out for the next couple of months, as well as the rest of the Alliance budget.
All that aside, Ackbar was happy to have gotten something. After the meeting, Ackbar went to talk to the Feegians Ambassador. Admiral Sign grabbed his arm and pulled him aside.
"Admiral Sing, what can I do for you."
"The ambassador's not going to agree to put our fleet under your command. He can't, our government won't allow it."
"I didn't think it would hurt to ask once more."
Sing grabbed his arm, "Look, he's doing his job. He's a diplomat, he doesn't know anything about combat."
"But it doesn't make any sense; he'll listen to you…"
"Like I said, the diplomats have their job, and we have ours. I know you can't have two commanders in charge of one taskforce."
The Alliance Admiral opened his mouth to argue with his Feegian counterpart, but Sing wasn't finished.
"Listen, just go along with what they say-once our forces come out of hyperspace at Endor-I will take orders from you."
Ackbar opened his mouth again, finally getting a chance to launch his rebuttal; but he stopped. Sing had agreed to what he wanted. Now he understood why the Feegian Admiral had pulled him aside. He let out a deep breath, no longer needing all the steam for his argument.
"Thank you, Admiral," he said to Sing, the weight of a light cruiser having been lifted from his shoulders.
"Not a problem Admiral, you have enough to worry about," the Feegian replied.
Ackbar took another deep breath, and started to relax a little. "Did you eat yet?" he asked Sing.
"No."
"Come on, I'm starving."
"You lead the way."
#
Melious took a sip of his beverage, "Well Captain, as soon as the generator is down I want to send in bombers," he answered.
"Mmm… what is this?" Neestas asked.
"It's Prakish burnt tea."
"Well, the ship's ready to go. Are you going to wait for the bombers to take out the big surface guns before sending in the capital ships?" Neestas asked as he looked around Melious office. It was a drab gray, stark contrast to his colorful flag mess and lounge.
"They should be able to take out all five of them within a few minutes, once the shield is down."
Melious seemed to be in a good mood. If he was at all stressed about their recent set back, or having to kill Captain Ajax, it wasn't showing.
"So, what's on your mind Admiral?"
"Well, if I have to send in the fleet while the big guns are operational, I want to know how much pounding this ship can take."
Neestas thought for a moment, this was not an easy question to answer.
"Here," Melious said, holding out a cigar. "In Thrama they smoke these to help them think."
Neestas accepted the cigar-and a light. "Well," he said, rocking his head from side to side, without realizing it. "Certainly 10 or 12 hits," he said, his mouth releasing the information as it arrived from the brain. "The armor on this thing is really thick," he said, continuing to think out loud. Neestas shrugged, "I mean, we could probably take 20 or 30 rounds, and the ship would still be operational. Some damage to the hangar bays, a few hundred dead, limited maneuverability maybe, that sort of thing. She'd still be able to fight, but after the battle, she'd have to spend some quality time in the shipyard," the captain explained.
Melious sat back, considering this information. "So, 10 or 12 rounds and the ships still in good shape?" Melious said, wanting a confirmation.
"Reasonably good shape," Neestas clarified. "I mean, those are massive ground batteries down there."
"I know, planet based weapons can get pretty big," Melious concurred.
A plate appeared in front of Melious, "Here you go Admiral," the pretty, young red haired officer said. Then she walked around the desk, "And Captain Neestas. I put some extra icing on the side captain, I know you like yours sweet," she said.
"Thank you, Ensign Shek," Neestas said, no longer making any effort to conceal his smile.
"You're very welcome," she said, also grinning. "Is there anything else I can do for you Captain Neestas?" she asked, leaning down close to him as she spoke.
"No thank you sw… Ensign," Neestas said.
At this point he hardly cared that he had again almost called her sweetheart. He would have to seriously think about that… later.
"Admiral?" she asked.
"I'm ok," Melious said.
With that, she walked back behind that wall. Neestas shifted his weight briefly as if to get up, until his brain saw what his body was doing and instructed it not to follow her back there. Melious smiled, not sure if Neestas had thought about doing what he thought Neestas had thought about doing.
#
Drakis relieved Lieutenant Commander Neetak on the twelve to five watch at 11:21 am, (nine minutes early). Along with him was an officer from one of the electrical divisions in the weapons department. Things were largely back to normal, they were 'friends' again, and Drakis still thought he had a chance with her.
"Drakis, there's a supply ship here with and old code. Hanger bay control wants to know if we should let them dock or not," Dehees said to Drakis.
"What's the name of the ship," Drakis asked.
Dehees pointed to a place on the monitor.
"This is how you patch through directly to these ships," Drakis said, as he showed Dehees.
He then spoke into the comm.
"Similak, Exar Kun, establish a holding pattern, we'll be sending out an assault shuttle to meet you," Drakis said.
Drakis then looked to Dehees, "That's what you're supposed to do. If they're going to miss their convoy, sometimes I'll just let them on board," he explained.
The code that the freighter Similak was using had expired. She moved off and waited to be inspected. The two freighters that were coming up behind her had perfectly good codes, and were instructed to land in hangar bay 3.
Hangar bay control watched them come in and dock from behind a transparisteel window, high up above the hangar deck. Actually, they were pretty busy directing other ships who were about to dock, or take off. Some workmen went over to the two freighters to begin unloading them. The men moved back as excessive amounts of gases and smoke were blowing out of the two ships.
One of the workmen standing behind the first freighter looked at the other," I'm surprised this piece of junk made it here," he said, as the large cargo hold doors on the freighter finally began to open. A ramp extended from the back of each of the two ships. The workmen couldn't even see inside, because of all the smoke.
One of them yelled up, "Hey, we can't get in there with all this…"
As he was speaking, the crew came running out of the freighter. For some reason, they were armed. Then they began blasting the crewmembers. As they ran down the ramp, they spread out around the freighter, the same scene being played out around the other freighter. Spraying automatic fire, they quickly wasted the crewmembers. The Alliance commandos coming out of the ships were fully clad in heavy armor. The first men fanned out and took one knee, rifles at the ready, to cover the rest of the men exiting the ships. One man loaded a shoulder-fired blaster, and took aim at a transparisteel canopy protruding from the bulkhead, two decks up.
"Bridge, hangar bay 3, we have…" the words were followed by an explosion, and then static.
That was all Lt. Drakis heard on the bridge. The commandos began blasting storm troopers, who were stationed in the hangar bay for just such an occasion. Some of the storm troopers returned fire, while others ran for cover. As soon as the 30 men from each freighter were off, they moved forward. Because one of the shifts was changing, there were three squads of stormtroopers in the hangar bay, instead of two. The commandos ran right up on the storm troopers, blasting them at point blank range.
Several of the storm troopers scored direct hits, but their blasters could not penetrate the extraordinarily expensive armor that these commandos were wearing. Within 40 seconds the hangar bay was clear, and they moved on. Team 1, from the first freighter, headed up and forward. Twenty-seven men from the other freighter headed for DC Central.
"Show me the hangar bay," Drakis yelled at an enlisted man.
The holo popped up, smoke and dead bodies were everywhere. One of the workers who had survived the attack was cautiously heading for a comm unit. A commando appeared out of nowhere and blasted him. Drakis looked at Dehees, "I didn't even see him!"
"Me either," she replied.
"Zoom in right there," Drakis said, pointing to the holo.
The man zoomed in.
"There's another one, they're hiding;" Dehees said.
Drakis was already running to a comm station.
"There's been an attempted takeover of the ship. All crewmembers arm yourselves and get out of the p-ways. Secure all sensitive areas of the ship, but leave the heavy fighting to our army detachment [storm troopers] and ships security forces," Drakis yelled over the loudspeaker, his face turning red as he did so.
"What do you need me to do?" Dehees asked.
He looked at her for a moment, trying to think.
"Get a hold of the captain and tell him what just happened," Drakis replied.
Then he ran over to an army officer, "Get me General Falkenhien, where are your troops at? Show me a holo."
"Sir, General Falkenhien is on the planet with most of our troops," the Major said.
"Ooohhh…. Shit," Drakis said, his mouth hanging open.
He took a deep breath.
"How many troops do you have onboard?" he asked.
The Major opened his mouth, "One… ".
"Who's in command?" Drakis interrupted
"General Pritwitz, and one brigade," the Major replied.
"Mark these points on the holo, Major. Here, here, and here," he said pointing to key passageways and intersections on the holo. "The entrance to the bridge, DC Central, engine rooms…" Drakis continued
"Right, right, we know those ones already-the sensitive areas; what else?" the major asked hurriedly.
"Uh… here," Drakis said, again pointing to the holo.
He was trying to position the troops to contain the rebels, as close to the hangar bay as possible. "…And get some troops into hangar bay 3, also, there are still a couple of rebels in there," he added.
The 30 men from Team 1 came up to a roadblock. Three squads of storm troopers were waiting for them. Both sides opened fire immediately. The p-way was lit up with fire. After twenty seconds of blaster fire and several proton grenades, the storm troopers were all dead. Five men from Team 1 were injured; some from heavy blaster rifles others from repeated hits from regular blasters.
"Captain, we have five men down," the commando Lieutenant said.
This was already a suicide mission, so they had no time to stop for injured men. The rebel captain ran over to his injured men.
"We have to keep moving, don't let anyone get through that passageway," he told them, pointing to an intersection. "Team 1, let's move," the captain ordered, leaving the injured to protect his rear.
The commandos from Team 1 began running again, albeit more cautiously this time. The Imperials had reacted faster than they had expected.
"Team 2, Team 1, get your men out of the hangar bay," the captain from Team 1 said.
His men were running at top speed with loads of equipment on them. They were Special Forces, and had done this many times during their six months of training; sometimes with as much as 100 lbs of equipment on each soldier's back.
"Captain, turn right up ahead," a sergeant yelled.
The captain stopped his men just before the intersection between the passageways.
"Corporal, look," he yelled as the men piled up against the bulkhead behind him.
The corporal peaked around the corner and saw stormtroopers setup.
"Looks like a light cannon and some infantry," he said.
"How many infantry?" the captain asked.
"Two or three squads, maybe four;" the young enlisted man replied.
"Sergeant, can we go around?" the captain asked, his voice muffled by his helmet and neck armor.
"I don't recommend it," the sergeant answered, his voice also muffled.
All the men were covered from head to toe with armor. Each man also had a breathing apparatus for any type of chemical attack, along with all the other doo-dads that go along with that sort of thing. The captain looked down the long gray passageway in front of him. There was a blast door about 100 meters away, and it was closed. The captain looked over at the holo map that the sergeant was projecting in front of him, from his hand held. The sergeant pointed to the map.
"We'd have to go all the way down here and then come back around."
The captain decided that his sergeant was right; they would have to go through the storm troopers.
"Alright," the captain said looking at his troops. "You three, go to the other side, and you two get on the ground in front of the p-way," he ordered. "Corporal, you take this side. One person on each side and the two on the ground fire four grenades each; everyone else count. As soon as they're done, we all come around the corner and charge the Imperials," the captain explained. The men checked and loaded their weapons.
"Ready… go!" the captain said.
Three men ran across the p-way, and two jumped to the ground in the middle of the intersection. The corporal peaked out from the corner and opened fire. They fired a total of 16 grenades, all exploding on an imaginary wall half way down the passageway.
"Wait! Wait!" one of the men on the ground yelled. They have a shield!" he screamed at the top of his lungs; as his comrades rounded the corner.
It was too late.