Title: Inner Demons, Outer Evils
Summary: A tragic event sets Rogue Squadron on the path to the truth...and sends one of the Rogues on a collision course with himself.
Disclaimer: Star Wars is, quite clearly, not mine, and no copyright infringement is intended. This story is not written for profit.
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Chapter 33: Tenacity
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"Where do we stand?" Leia asked, walking into the conference room, Jesina a step behind her.
"Hekrig's SSD, five Imperial-class Star Destroyers, three Mark IIs, three Victory-class, two Corellian heavy cruisers. No news on fighter complements, because they haven't deployed yet," Bel Iblis replied.
"How did he amass that much firepower without us knowing about it?" Leia asked.
"Right now I'd be inclined to say that Joss Layfee kept the information out of our hands," Jesina muttered. "Cracken probably suspected something, sent Mik Korlis to Antoinn – I guarantee you that that's where he's been staging his operations out of – and Layfee found out and had Korlis killed."
Ackbar swiveled his eyes toward her. "You seem to know more than we do, my dear."
Leia cast a sideways glance at Jesina. "We've just spent the last couple of hours learning about all this ourselves." She frowned. "Has anyone been able to contact Wedge?"
"No, we have not," Ackbar replied.
"We have, however, located them, we believe," Bel Iblis interrupted. "There were several reports of shots fired in or around the east hangar bay. Two units of military police were dispatched, but they've been out of contact for some time."
"Jamming," Jesina muttered. "We sent Majors Janson and Cracken after the Rogues. They were ordered to communicate with my office upon learning anything about the condition of the rest of the squadron – not that I really expected them to."
"That hangar's useless to us, then, isn't it?" Jesina asked.
Ackbar nodded. "Unfortunately, yes. We can only launch out of the west and south bays – and, as you know, the east is our primary hangar. A number of squadrons cannot access their fighters."
"Including the Aces, and the Rogues who are presumably under fire right now."
"Yes."
"Someone needs to find out what's going on down there," Leia said. "Send someone down with strict orders to report back immediately. We can't do anything until we know what's going on. And order our ships to standby for battle."
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Myn scrambled forward, grabbing Wedge's arm and dragging him back across the floor. "Are you hit?"
"Just a graze," Wedge replied, teeth clenched tightly. He ran a hand down the outside of his left thigh, and winced. "Damn that hurts."
"Yeah." Myn fired a couple more shots toward the door and then looked back at his CO. "What do we do?"
"We're being jammed, so we can't call for help, and there's too much open space between here and that door. We can try for the rear entrance."
"Except that you can't run."
"Don't worry about me."
Donos glanced over at him. "Yeah, right." He returned his attention the steady field of blaster fire coming from the door. "There's no way people haven't realized we're being shot at in here."
"Oh, I'm sure they realized it. It's just a question of what they can actually do about it."
"Uh huh." Myn gave him a pointed look. "There's one shooter, hiding behind a doorway."
"We know that. Everyone else doesn't. All they know is that they can hear blaster fire. They have no way of knowing where exactly it's coming from, how many shooters, etcetera. And if it's military police who respond, in cases like this, they have standing orders not to walk into a fight until they've thoroughly assessed the situation."
His words were punctuated by the blare of a siren overhead.
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"Ma'am, we need to get you to safety."
"That's a scramble alarm," Leia muttered, annoyed with the guards surrounding her and trying to shuffle her down the hallway. "The Palace isn't being invaded."
"Ma'am, we can't take any chances."
"There's a squadron of pilots under fire as we speak. Shouldn't you be trying to help people who are in actual danger, as opposed to—" She didn't get to finish her sentence. One second she'd been about to walk into the turbolift lobby. The next she was in some side room, pinned to the ground by at least two guards, listening to blaster bolts being traded back and forth outside. She heard people shouting back and forth but couldn't understand any of the words.
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Wes didn't know what made him turn around – maybe just years of sensing the enemy's movements before they moved – but he spun seconds before another shooter appeared in the doorway he'd come through, blaster aimed perfectly at Inyri's head. He swung back around, throwing his arm around Inyri, and dove to the side, dragging her out of the path of the blaster bolt.
"What the—" she exclaimed, but quieted when he rolled off of her, coming up on his knee, blaster aimed toward the door.
He fired quickly, not bothering to aim. Not that it made a difference. The shooter was already back through the door. "That's it," he muttered. "You want to shoot at me when I'm in my fighter, fine. But let me get into the damn thing first."
He dropped back down onto his stomach and inched across the floor. As he moved, he glanced around, assuring himself that he knew where Pash Cracken was. "Warn me if there's anything headed my way," he said to Inyri as he crawled by her.
"What are you doing?"
"Something stupid, probably," he replied. "Give me a shout if I'm in trouble."
"Don't be a hero, Wes."
"We're not going to get out of here unless someone plays hero," he replied. With that, he broke into a run, nearly colliding with the wall he ran toward, and flattened himself against it. He made a perfect target for the first gunmen, but the second would have to bring himself into Pash's line of fire to get a shot at him.
Then he looked around for the Wraiths. Who seemed to have a similar idea about dealing with the first shooter.
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Jesina was heading back to her office, satisfied that Leia was in good hands, when the scramble alarm went off overhead and she heard the announcement for pilots to head to their fighters and standby to launch. The hangars weren't technically in the palace, but they were attached through tunnels, and probably half the pilots on duty at the moment were in the palace lounges or training rooms.
And a second after that, she rounded a corner just to duck back as a blaster bolt narrowly missed her face. Drawing her own weapon, she dropped to one knee and leaned forward as far as she dared. She saw a cloaked figure whirl around and break into a run. "Damn it," she muttered, jumping to her feet and trying to aim at the same time. Her first couple shots hit the wall ahead of her as the would-be assassin turned a corner.
As she approached, she slowed to a cautious walk. She wouldn't do anyone any good if she got herself killed for no reason.
Then she saw the glint of metal and dove forward, tucking her head in and rolling across the floor, coming up on her feet about a meter and a half away – and directly in front of the shooter. Firing on instinct, she didn't try to absorb the kickback from the blaster. Instead, she fed off its momentum, rocking backward on the balls of her feet just as she pulled the trigger. She landed flat on her back as a blaster bolt passed right over her.
She rolled onto her stomach, coming up facing the other way. Spinning around quickly as she got to her feet, she saw that her assailant hadn't been as lucky as she. She'd caught him in his left shoulder – his gun arm. He'd dropped his weapon and was running, right hand pressed to his shoulder.
This time, she switched her weapon to stun and took the time to aim. Feeling a slight sense of satisfaction as the blue bolt hit him square in the back, she approached him as he crumpled to the ground.
Holstering her blaster, she knelt beside him, and rolled him onto his back. Slowly, she pulled back his hood and shook her head. Resting her left arm on her knee, she sighed. "I always did admire your tenacity."