"Go!" Carlos whispered.

Maya, now first in the line, kicked out the vent cover and leapt down onto the catwalk, with Dena, another Juniper worker, following.

"–Maya–!"

"–Dena–!"

They both fired in their respectable directions, then disappeared in those separate directions, allowing Carlos and the rest of the squad to jump out. Bryan re-holstered his blaster and swung his sniper rifle–which his rescuers had brought–around into both hands. Kneeling in the open vent, he activated the sniper's scope, and trained the crosshair on the operations booth on the other side of the hangar. There were three controllers sitting in there, and one Lieutenant walking around, giving orders. Bryan chose to aim at the far left controller and fingered the trigger. But then, the Lieutenant stood over that controller, and presented himself as an easy target. So Bryan moved the crosshair slightly over and fired, though he hesitated regretfully at first. The shot zipped across the bay, went straight through the transparisteel window, and hit the exposed Lieutenant right on the front of his collar. His blood splattered onto the controller, who reacted slowly to it, and was then hit in his face by Bryan's second shot. The other two controllers ducked behind their control panels, hiding.

Bryan sighed in reluctance and zoomed out, using the scope to scan for targets along the far catwalk. He spotted two to his left, standing and firing across the bay; perfect prey. Two shots later, they both were fallen on the deck.

Suddenly, a Stormtrooper backed into his view just outside the vent. Warily, Bryan picked up his gun from its holster and aimed it steadily at the trooper.

"Bryan, we need some help out here!" the trooper suddenly shouted. Judging by the voice, Bryan guessed that it was Gerreth, the Trisalkan Security Lieutenant on Juniper.

One of ours, Bryan thought.

Then suddenly, Gerreth got shot right on the chin of his helmet. He dropped to the ground instantly, dead. Bryan dropped his sniper rifle and burst out of the vent, instinctively pointing his gun to his right, and just held the trigger. Luckily, no one was in his way, and the shots raced into a line of four Stormtroopers in the distance. Three went down, and the other fell into the wall. Bryan quickly snapped a shot off at him, which hit him in his shooting arm, knocking the gun out of his hands. Bryan finished him with a third shot to his stomach.

"Shit!" Steno Raffle shouted. "We got more company comin' in!" He fired pot shots destined for the opposite catwalk.

Bryan followed Steno's gaze—

–"They got snipers!"–

—and saw two strike teams full of Stormtroopers come storming into the bay from two separate entrances on both sides of the launch booth. Immediately, he raised his blaster and added to Steno's volleys, though he knew it wasn't going to do much. They would need more firepower to survive this assault. However, the answer to that problem was right in front of him—

One of the six TIE Fighters hanging on the top rack.

Bryan re-holstered his gun and dropped to one knee, re-gripping the sniper rifle, and propping its nozzle on the top of the railing. He targeted a fool Stormtrooper on the other side, a sniper, who was standing still as he aimed across. With a smirk, Bryan picked him off in one shot. When that was done, he turned back to his partners. "Hey Carlos?!"

Luckily, Carlos was the nearest one to him. "What?!"

Bryan tossed the sniper rifle at him, and it landed at his feet. "I'm putting the sniper rifle at your feet, so watch out!"

"Why?!"

"'Cause!" Bryan responded as he crawled over to a flight of stairs, a stray shot from a sniper shooting the air where he had just been. "I'm takin' one of the Fighters! Cover me please!" He took the stairs two at a time. They were steep, so he made sure to time his jumps perfectly, all while trying his best to dodge shots from that one sniper. He finally made it to the first rack of TIEs, waited until the sniper fired again, then made a run for the nearest TIE, jumping into the cockpit as a late shot from the sniper sizzled over his head. He quickly closed the hatch and powered up the TIEs systems. His only problem now was that the TIE was locked to the rack by docking clamps that would need to be forcibly removed. So Bryan activated the comlink and opened all channels, all frequencies, meaning that a majority of the ship and the Stormtrooper comlinks would be able to hear him. It didn't really matter anymore though. "Carlos!" he shouted. Please tell me you can hear this.

"Bryan?!"

"Yeah, buddy, its me. I need you to shoot out the docking clamps on this thing. They're locked."

He heard him grunt. "That's not gonna be easy!"

"Well try," Bryan told him gently. "If I can get free, I can wrap those guys up for you in a few seconds." An idea popped into his head. "In fact, I can buy you some time right now. Hang on." He pressed his thumbs on the triggers on top of the steering yoke, and a flurry of hot lasers screamed from the TIEs twin guns. They crashed into the far wall, cutting into it. On the catwalk far above, the ground underneath the Stormtroopers shook like an earthquake, pitching and rocking furiously. Two were thrown over the railing, and fell to their deaths. Others were knocked down. Bryan released the triggers. "Do it now!" he shouted into the com. "Quick; while they're still down! I'm the first Fighter on the right!"

"You got it!" Carlos shouted with new energy. "Maya!"

A minute later, the two reached the Fighter and blasted the clamps off of it. Bryan grabbed the yoke and guided the Fighter away from the racks and then up towards the opposite catwalk. Starting from the right side, he strafed the entire right side of the catwalk, killing every trooper on that side, and ripping the catwalk from the wall. It dangled helplessly, held up only by the left side, which Bryan strafed next. The next second, the entire catwalk was blown from the wall, and all the enemy Stormtroopers in the hangar were dead.

That done, Bryan flew back over to the other side, where his discovered that his rescuers were only down to three; Steno and Gerreth were dead. Bodies from the battle were strewn everywhere on the catwalk. "Jump on when you get the chance guys," he said over the comlink. He had to do this just right for then to do that, though. So he brought the Fighter as close to the catwalk as he could, turning it around so that he couldn't see them; however, he slowed it down slightly above the catwalk, which allowed the craft to fall gently and slowly. Carlos, Maya, and Dena jumped onto the hatch of the TIE. Once on, Bryan turned up the power to the ion engines, and gently floated it away from the catwalk and the TIE racks.

"Take us to the deck," Carlos said. "We're stealing one of those Gamma Assault Shuttles."

"Ooo," Bryan whistled. "Nice choice."

"Thank you," Carlos answered with new cheer.

Once into open area again, Bryan cut the engines to minimum power, and so the TIE began to fall, with a kind of grace, towards the black, stainless hangar deck. He immediately spun the TIE around the face all the other TIEs sitting on the racks. Also, a large contingent of Stormtroopers had gathered on all the catwalks that were between racks. Bryan smirked. "Hang on guys," he said. Maneuvering the TIE gently so as not to knock off his passengers, Bryan began strafing all the catwalks as he made his way down the levels, also taking out numerous TIEs in their clamps. The Stormtroopers were barely a match, powerless against the TIEs immense laser power.

It took a while, and created a lot of noise, but the TIE finally reached the bottom. After conferring with Carlos, Bryan tipped the Fighter onto its back, barely floating it, and Carlos, Maya, and Dena jumped off. "Get to the shuttle!" he told them. "I'll cover you then...land somehow."

"Got it!" Carlos responded.

Bryan brought the Fighter upright again, and immediately spotted a whole troop of Stormtroopers running as fast as they could into the bay from a tiny entrance across the hangar. For the third time in the last ten minutes, Bryan smirked, turned the Fighter in that direction, and opened fire. And, as with any bunch of Stormtroopers that had challenged him, they were killed instantly.

So Bryan patrolled the hangar for a minute longer. No more reinforcements came, and he got his signal.

"We're in Bryan," Maya told him. "Land and get in here!"

"On it!" Bryan tipped the Fighter low to the ground so that he was looking at the floor, seeing his reflection on the spotless deck. He then cut the power to the engines completely, and the Fighter crashed into the deck. The transparisteel canopy shattered, and the crash ended with a light "thud." Bryan opened the hatch in a hurry, and scurried from the TIE, bolting for the assault shuttle. Once he was inside, he found his way to the cockpit. "I'm drivin!'" he announced before anyone could argue. Shooing Maya out of the pilot's chair, he settled in and quickly identified all of the essential controls–engine power and propulsion, weapons, shields etc. "All right," he said anxiously. "Here we go." He activated the repulsorlift engines, and lifted the heavy shuttle off the ground. "Get to those gun stations," he ordered the other three. "I'll get the fourth." As they took seats behind him, Bryan glided the shuttle to the hangar mouth, and scanned it. Much to his disappointment, he discovered a problem. "Shit. Their shields are up. I've got an idea though. Hang on." He tipped the shuttle vertically and pumped the throttle, jolting the craft slowly out the hangar mouth, but making sure he didn't drive it too far into the Eraser's shields. Watching his proximity monitors closely, he expertly guided the large shuttle spotlessly out of the hangar. Grunting, the pilot managed to keep it from hitting the bottom shield. "Shields up. Start firing at the surface. Any turbolaser guns you can destroy will be helpful." He practically hugged the hull though, making shooting at anything very difficult. The Eraser's guns pounded salvo after salvo at the shuttle, but the shields ate most of them up, though they were steadily being brought down. After what seemed like forever, the shuttle finally reached the port side surface, and Bryan had to practically make the long ship do a flip to curve onto that side without hitting the Super Star Destroyer's shields. Straightening it out, he flew the shuttle quickly off that surface and onto the top hull of the Eraser. Behind him, the other three fired back rapidly at the Star Destroyer's weapons. Since the shuttle was underneath the Eraser's shields, the shots easily tore apart any gun–or anything at all–on the Destroyer's hull. Nevertheless, that also meant that there were trapped. But Bryan had an idea on how to get rid of that problem.

"Those shields are going to have to come down t–" Dena started.

"On it," Bryan interrupted. He aimed the assault shuttle at the command deck, and jammed the throttle to full. The acceleration flung him back against his seat as the shuttle rocketed towards the bridge at the center of the command deck. However, as he reached the half-way point, another idea came into his head, one that he was sure would bring down the shields instead of his original idea, which was to threaten Admiral Bengold. "Wait, hang on," he hesitated. "Never mind," Bryan said, cutting the throttle back and veering the shuttle in the opposite direction. For a moment, Maya was thrown from her seat while the rest struggled to maintain their balance. Pushing his feet against the bulkhead, Bryan kept himself upright as he heard the shuttle hull strain against the sharp turn. As he struggled to straighten the ship, he pushed the throttle to full again and blasted away towards the wedge-shaped bow of the ship. "Call Cano," Bryan said to Carlos. "Let me talk to him."

Carlos hesitated then handed a comlink to him from inside his belt. "You're not going to do what I think you're going to do are you?"

"Best thing to do in this case," Bryan answered.

That drew some nervous breath from all of his rescuers.

"Rawling to Cano?" He whispered. "You there?" Cutting the throttle back, and turned his head to the back. "Keep firing," he said to the other three.

"Yeah," came the whisper. He did sound young. "I heard you over the Imperial comlink. Did you get out okay?"

"Yes, Mr. Cano. Your friends did a good job. But I appreciate you the most Mr. Cano, for you volunteered to do, and I thank you. I will never forget this, and I'll make sure the Alliance doesn't either. Now it's time to blow the core. Do it, and goodbye and thank you again Cano."

--

Cano nodded to no one, turned off the comlink in his Stormtrooper helmet, and got ready to do his part of the rescue. But first, he had something else to do. He raised his blaster and fired off a shot at the nearest Stormtrooper guard, who was walking in the opposite direction, back turned to Cano. The trooper was hit in the back, and fell to the deck. But Cano didn't wait around to enjoy his kill. After he had fired the shot, he leapt over the guard rail, satisfied to have at least killed one Imperial personally.

He had always wanted to join the Alliance, but he never got the chance too; Juniper was always too far out of Alliance territory.

Cano kept his finger pressed on the trigger as he fell. A split second before he impacted, he pressed a button on the waist of his armor, detonating the thirty pounds of sonic explosives attached to his chest and stomach, hidden under his Stormtrooper armor. And his body was being broken apart, his last thought was seeing Admiral Bengold's terrified face as the bastard died.

--

Bryan flipped off the comlink and waited, getting more and more nervous as the bow of the Destroyer was almost under the window.

Then the Eraser exploded brighter than a thousand stars.

The command deck–and Admiral Bengold, Bryan hoped–was taken out in a flash, incinerated. The shields were down the moment it happened. There was a new problem though; the force of the explosion had caused the bow section to start into a flip, so Bryan jammed the throttle to full again, clearing the bow and blasting away from the wrecked Super Star Destroyer.

Bryan heard Maya scream in excitement, but that was nothing compared to Carlos's deep "whoop." He grinned proudly but kept his concentration on the controls.

Maya took off her helmet and wrapped her arms around Bryan's neck. "Nice flying," she complimented.

Bryan's joy suddenly dropped, and grin faded greatly.

Patting her hands on his shoulders, she then told him, "Set a course for Juniper. Coordinates 385 Mark 5."

Now free to maneuver, Bryan placed the shuttle into a roundabout curve, plotting the course Maya had dictated—which was right back in the direction of the other Super Star Destroyer, Vader's Destroyer, the Gatekeeper. "Thank you, and thank you for rescuing me."

Maya smiled warmly. "Your welcome."

"Good, now get your fucking hands off me." He reached up and wretched her hands free of his shoulder. Then, he turned and frowned, completely, at her. "In my book you're still a traitor. Now I am thankful for what you've done since but that does not mean you are forgiven or off the hook for what you have already done. You jeopardized the lives of hundreds of Alliance personnel and pilots, you jeopardized my life and Emilie's, whose supposedly your friend; Ambassador Vidarix was killed–"

"Now hold on a second–!" Carlos started.

"That was all the Empire!" Maya shouted back, first, at Bryan. "They did all that, not me! They swore to me that they wouldn't hurt you or Vidarix. I swear I didn't know. They also swore–!"

"Yeah, and they tricked you; fooled you!" Bryan shouted triumphantly. "Guess what Maya; that happens when you decide to trust the Empire; they fool you!"

Maya struggled to speak, her mouth opening and closing furiously.

But Carlos stepped up first. "Excuse me, Commander, but she just risked her life and the lives of five other people to save you from a holding cell and Darth Vader–!"

"Which is why we're going to discuss her innocence when we get back to the Liberty, assuming it's still alive. Now can we stop for now?" He pointed out the window in the direction of the Gatekeeper. "'Cause we're not outta this yet. Lucky you guys came along, 'cause it looks like I was about to be turned over to Vader."

No one answered him, all still tense from the short fight they'd had.

Oh brother, Bryan thought. He didn't have much time to think; the sensors were picking up numerous TIE Fighter contacts on intercept courses all over the grid. "Here we go. Keep up the fire guys." Bryan paid close attention the TIEs distance, now only four klicks away and closing fast. "All right..." It quickly closed to less than two klicks away, and Bryan felt his muscles tense. He counted at least twenty TIEs coming. "Get ready..." The TIEs reached 1.7 klicks away, and Bryan saw them start blasting away. He juked the shuttle towards the shots but took it below the first volley. Thinking quickly, he pitched the shuttle left, keeping one step ahead of the slow TIEs. After going left and then right for a few seconds, he then yanked back on the control yoke and brought the shuttle, the TIEs practically on top of it now, on a direct intercept course with them.

"What are you doing?!" Dena shouted.

"Best way to get rid of pursuit: charge 'em," Bryan answered. He fired his laser cannons and pushed the throttle to maximum, plowing straight into the immense TIE wave. The Fighters danced this way and that, shooting past the cockpit window, firing wildly. The shuttle fired back, it's eight guns tearing into the shield-less TIEs. Having soon cleared the TIE wave, he veered the shuttle sharply back onto its original heading, the throttle still at maximum. The Gatekeeper also started firing away at the shuttle with its powerful turbolasers.

"Bryan, get away from that thing!" Maya cautioned.

"I know, I know!" Bryan told her.

"No, no, not because of the guns! The tractor beam!"

Bryan's eyes widened. "Oh, shit! Forgot about that!" He turned the shuttle back towards the TIEs , who had now spread their numbers out. Then, he veered the shuttle to starboard, ahead of a warning light on the controls. "Just missed a tractor lock." Watching his monitor closely, he checked the ETA to the Juniper coordinates. Four-and-a-half klicks to the jump; one minute—

And that was when the Gatekeeper's tractor beam locked onto the assault shuttle. Bryan was jolted forward onto the controls, his head bashing into the cockpit window. Carlos, Maya, and Dena yelped in surprise as they were thrown from their chairs and onto the floor behind him.

"They got a lock!" Bryan shouted. He quickly pulled the throttle back to zero and off, and waited, anxiously, putting up a finger at the others. "Hang on!" He saw on the HUD that the TIEs were backing off, heading back to the Gatekeeper. "Wait, wait..." The tractor beam yanked at the shuttle, pulling it slowly. The TIEs got beyond the two-point-five klick mark, and Bryan sprung back into action. He brought up the controls to the shields and started fiddling around with the harmonic settings, rotating their frequencies so that the shields warped in and out of function. A second later, the warped shields caused the tractor beam to lose its lock, and Bryan jammed the throttle back to full, again tossing everybody in the ship. The shuttle was once again flying towards the Juniper coordinates. It took the TIE Fighters a full five seconds to realize what was going on, and then turn around and pursue the shuttle again. They wouldn't be a threat anymore. Bryan checked the HUD again a few seconds later. Three-point-three kilcks now.

Using his best instincts, he veered and pitched the shuttle back and forth. The Gatekeeper kept trying to lock on, but failed.

"Almost there!" Bryan announced. Under two klicks.

Five seconds later, the shuttle reached to under one-point-five klicks. Bryan thrust the hyperdrive lever forward, and watched with relief as the stars stretched across space and the assault shuttle plunged into hyperspace, escaping the Gatekeeper and Vader.

--

"Bryan!" Maya shouted from behind the wall of energy that locked her in her cell, but it was no use. Bryan walked beyond the doors of the cell bay, not listening–nor not caring–and they closed behind him immediately. Maya sighed in disappointment and frowned over at Emilie Rodenski. "What is his problem? I saved him–I–I saved him from Vader, from torture...—" "I know," Emilie responded. "But that's the way he is. He doesn't like people who betray him, no matter what. Even if you make it up to him he'll hate you. Like I said, its just the way he is."

Maya sighed again. "I hope he's thankful at least. I lost some friends in that rescue. Very good friends of mine."

Emilie held up her hands in defense. "Don't worry, he is. He'll come around eventually. Just give him some time."

Maya breathed. "I hope he does."

Emilie nodded.

Maya started pacing in front of the energy shield. "So how long do I have to stay in here?"

"I don't know. I should make you endure it for a month though..." She blew a lock of her hair out of her face. "But I'll only keep you locked up until the day after tomorrow. That seems long enough."

Maya nodded. "Okay." She looked her old friend in the eye. "I'm really sorry about this. I–I..." she let the sentence trail off, not knowing how to apologize for what she had done. "I'll pay for every one of these repairs if you want to, I..."

"You'd better be sorry," Emilie said seriously. "'Cause you've caused a lot of damage. I can't even BEGIN to tell you how angry I am at you for this. Ambassador Vidarix was killed; the Darwas, the Gilgarin, and the Black Hawk were destroyed—" she paused in exasperation—"A lot of pilots were killed, including my Commander, Bryan was captured, both the Liberty and the Faith were damaged, the Liberty severely damaged, I–I–––You ever do this again and I will personally shove you out the airlock, you got me?!"

"Yes," Maya said quietly. "I—"

"You'll be lucky to get out of your trial alive!"

"I–I know...but did the chip verify? Is that good?"

Emilie nodded matter-of-fact. "It was, but you're gonna need a lot more than that to defend yourself."

"I know," Maya said more sharply.

"Good. I have to go now though. Think about what you've done in the next few days." Emilie gave her one last angry look then started back down the corridor, towards where Bryan had exited.

Maya watched her go in agony, now feeling absolutely ashamed of what she had done, especially after what Bryan had told her.

Originally, the Empire had threatened to destroy her station if she didn't help them capture Emilie and Bryan(they had found out about the diplomatic conference between the Alliance and the Koolians through an Autrellien informant). However, Bryan had found out through research that it was unlikely that the Empire would destroy Juniper. According to what he had found, Juniper was the only marketing outpost in the whole Gole sector. A majority of Imperial trade ships docked with it. If Juniper was ever destroyed, it would throw off the entire Imperial trade in that sector, possibly beyond sanction. So even the Empire wouldn't dare touch Juniper because of its trade value. Maya had known this and presented it to the Imperials, but they had shown her a location of three fake stations, and then went so far as to create artificial information about those fake stations which Maya had seen herself. It had been that that had convinced her to take the Empire's offer. She hadn't done enough research, and it had now made her end up in an Alliance holding cell with a trial for multiple crimes, including manslaughter and treason, in two days. But she wasn't worried about that at all. She had done enough for the Alliance to earn her freedom. She was more concerned about Bryan, and feared that nothing would ever change between them after this. She feared she had lost him forever. So she sat down on the cot in her cell, eyes tearing up, and just prayed to...to anyone listening, for forgiveness.