Chapter 11

Buck and Dyna walked around looking for Zack and Lona. They had disappeared for a long time and they had to begin preparing for the operation. Buck decided to look for Lona in her room because out of Zack and her, he could stand her better. Just as he and Dyna were about to knock on her door, it slid open to reveal Zack. Both Buck and Zack were startled to see each other.

"Zack?" Buck said as Dyna quickly joined Buck.

"Buck! Dyna. I was just talking to Lona." He said nodding behind him to Lona, who was dressed in a nightdress. She looked down to the ground, even her ebony skin could not hide the fact that she was blushing.

"Talking? Riiiight." Buck said, noting Zack's messy hair.

"Ooooo, I bet I know what they were talking about." Dyna said, almost giggling.

"Oh, you know nothing kid!" Zack said.

"Anyways, we're a few hours away from getting this thing started, so I suggest we all prepare." Buck said. "Come on, Dyna. I want to go over flying the ship again." Buck said which caused Dyna to whine and complain.

Zack looked back at Lona and smiled. They shared a short kiss before he left.

/

The crew of The Diversity had gathered at the entrance of Lona's Room, where the two ships were connected. Buck had on his Stormtrooper armour. Zack had on a blue jacket that was not fully zipped up, revealing the black shirt beneath. He finished the look with black pants. Lona wore her brown leather jacket with a black turtle neck underneath and black pants with a holster strapped to her hip. Buck stood back as Lona and Zack said their goodbyes to the Twi'Lek girl. When it was his turn he walked forward and smiled at the girl. He kneeled down to his knee so that he could be at eye level with her.

"So you have your blaster ready?" He asked which prompted her to take out the gun out from the makeshift holster that was strapped behind her. Buck smiled at her quick response. "And what do you do if you see shady character."

"I shoot him through the head!" She said.

Buck smiled and patted her on the head before getting up to his feet. She re-holstered the blaster behind her. Dyna backed away. She walked back to Lona's room, looking at the three smiling human faces. "May the Force be with you, all of you." Dyna said before she pressed the button on the side of the wall, which caused a door to slide shut. They waited until they heard the sound of Lona's Room detaching and jet away. They all began walking to the control room except for Buck who went to the smaller ship, mounted on The Diversity.

Lona and Zack got into the control room and sat at the two pilot seats, with Zack as pilot and Lona as co-pilot.

"You ready?" She asked.

"I hope so." Zack answered. "Entering hyperspace... now!" The stars began to blur into long lines as the ship shot into the darkness of space, leaving the smaller ship that Dyna was in behind.

/

The Razmass was a Star Destroyer with over a hundred highly skilled crew members. Its mission was to deliver fifty dangerous criminals to the prison planet, Ekadi. The man in charge of the ship was one, Admiral John Soot. He was a newly appointed Admiral with a spotless record, serving the Empire. He had seen his fair share of battle but jumped at the opportunity of leaving the hazardous task of chasing down Rebels for an easy job of transporting them and other criminals the Empire wanted to lock away on a prison planet. However, this prisoner transportation was not going to be like all the others.

"Sir, there's a ship approaching from hyperspace." One of the men in the control room informed the Admiral.

The Admiral got up from his chair and walked forward to look out to space from the window in the control deck. "What is its identity?"

"Unknown, sir."

The Admiral grumbled to himself. "As soon as it exits hyperspace, train our guns on it."

Meanwhile, Zack and Lona were in the control room as they sped through to their destination. Buck sat in the smaller ship and looked out. He could only see the blue hue caused by travelling in hyperspace. His leg shook nervously, as he did not want their ship to crash into the Star Destroyer and end their mission before it began.

The control room of the Star Destroyer, everyone was growing nervous as they realised that the incoming ship had not made any attempt to exit hyperspace. "Sir, they don't seem to be making their jump out of hyperspace."

The Admiral gritted his teeth. "Raise the shields!"

"They won't cover the whole ship in time, sir!" One of the other crew members said.

Lona was starting to feel nervous too. She glanced over at Zack who had a stern look on his face. She could not tell if he was as worried as she was. Zack was in intense concentration. He was trying to tune in into the Force, hoping that it would tell him when to stop. A drop of sweat fell from his brow as he realised that he did not feel anything. Nothing! If he did not do something, they would all die and it would be his fault. Had the Foce abandoned him? Was he wrong about his ability? Suddenly, he felt something. It was a small feeling at first but then it began growing exponentially. Soon the feeling was overwhelming and it seemed to scream one thing, "STOP!"

Zack put the ship out of hyperspace and it appeared just inches above the Razmass. Everyone, from Buck in the smaller ship to the Admiral in the control room, breathed a sigh of relief. Zack quickly got up and ran for the smaller ship where Buck was waiting while Lona took over the pilot chair. The communication instruments lit up and the Admiral's image appeared above the dashboard of the ship.

"Identify yourself ship?" The Admiral Soot said.

Lona kept quiet and instead prepared to make another jump into hyperspace and away from the ship. Zack ran through the hall and climbed up the smaller ship to join Buck in there. The smaller ship was totally purple as it rested and was a part of the purple section of The Diversity.

"Identify yourself or we will shoot you down in three seconds!" The Admiral said.

Zack got in and he and Buck detached the smaller ship and let it fall to the side.

"Lona, get moving!" Zack shouted into his communicator.

The engines roared to life as the ship sped forward. Laser fire tried to shoot the Diversity but Lona kept it ahead of the gunfire, dodging the laser bolts

. The forward and rear guns were trained on the Destroyer and began shooting at it. The rebel ship, which was small compared to the Razmass did little damage as by this time, the Destroyer had its shields well activated.

"The ship is hostile! Send out TIE fighters to apprehend it!" The Admiral shouted out.

On cue, two TIE fighters exited the launch pad of the Razmass to pursue.

"Lona, get out of here!" Zack ordered again as their ship bypassed the Destroyer's shield..

Lona saw the two TIE fighters approaching and gritted her teeth. "But I need to buy you guys more time."

"You've brought us enough! Go!" Zack repeated.

"I agree with Zack, Lona." Buck said into the smaller ships communicator. "You need to go."

Lona relented and prepared the ship to jump into hyperspace. Just as the two TIE fighters were reaching her, The Diversity disappeared into hyperspace and away from them.

Zack and Buck floated in space for a while. Their small ship had not been noticed yet, which allowed them to land it on the side of the much bigger Star Destroyer. The first part of the plan had been successful and now the second part began, they had to board the ship.

/

The Diversity exited hyperspace, where Lona's Room was. The bigger ship hovered towards the smaller one before they connected. Dyna ran from the smaller ship into the bigger one. She entered the hanger where she saw Lona, who she gratefully hugged.

"You guys did it!" She said.

"Only the first part. The mission is not over yet." Lona said.

"Can't we contact Buck and Zack?" Dyna said. "Ask them if they're okay."

"No," Lona said looking at the communication panel of the ship. "We have to keep radio silence on our side. They have to contact us."

/

A shaft of green light penetrated the wall of the Razmass and it retreated back into the wall as quickly as it appeared. There were whispers coming out of the other side of the newly created hole. They were arguing on whether there was no one on the other side. In their argument a few incidents of name calling happened before they finally calmed down and decided to move forward with the plan. The green shaft of light came out of the wall again and slowly traced a big imperfect circle around the first small hole made. The section of the wall fell out onto the ground and out walked a Stromtrooper and a man with long hair and a green lightsaber.

"That's going to be quickly noticed," Buck said looking as the circular cut out section of the wall lying on the floor.

"Don't worry," Zack said. He deactivated his lightsaber and returned it to his hip. Zack thrust his hands out towards the piece of the wall. It began to slowly levitate and floated to the hole in the wall. It slowly fitted into place like a puzzle piece completing a picture, the picturfe in this case being the grey wall.

"Nice trick. Let's hope it will fool everyone for long enough." Buck said.

Zack nodded. "Let's get moving."

They both ran off into the other areas of the ship.

"Racer 2 to Diversity, come in please." Buck said into his communicator.

"This is Diversity," Lona's voice came through from the other side of his communicator, "reading you loud and clear."

"We have infiltrated the moving cage." Buck said.

"Good... where is Racer 1?" Lona asked.

Although no one could see it, Buck rolled his eyes in his helmet. "His alive and well."

"Hello, Diversity." Zack said leaning into Buck's communicator.

"We are commencing with phase two of the plan: finding The Egg. Over and out." Buck said putting the communicator away.

They had to stop and hide as a few Troopers walked by. They continued to sneak on through the base making their way to the holding cells of the ship. Buck led the way while Zack followed behind.

"Hey, what are you doing here?" Zack heard someone say from behind him. Zack looked and saw that Buck had disappeared somewhere ahead of him. He slowly turned around to see a Stormtrooper pointing his blaster at him. He had been spotted!

Zack slowly reached for his lightsaber.

"I asked you a question," The Stormtrooper said, shaking his blaster at him.

"Oh there you are!" Someone said from behind them and to Zack's relief there was another Stormtrooper with a helmet on but he recognised the somewhat distorted voice. "I'm sorry officer, he's my responsibility." Buck said grabbing Zack's arms and pretending to handcuff him.

The Stormtrooper lowered his blaster. "Who is he?"

"Unprocessed prisoner." Buck said. "He was a last minute addition."

"Oh. One of those, huh?" The Stormtrooper said approaching Zack and looking at him in the face. "Don't worry, Ekadi will break you down, criminal scum!"

Buck roughly pushed Zack forward and nodded at the Stromtrooper as he left.

"You seem to have enjoyed that." Zack said to Buck once they were away from the Stormtrooper.

"How would you know, you can't even see my face." Buck said sounding smug. "And anyways, this is a better way for us to move to the holding cells. Better than sneaking around like some... Night Sisters."

They got to the prison area where there were two Stormtroopers standing guard. Just behind the Stormtroopers were white double sliding doors that led to the wider area where the prisoners of the ship were being held. There was a security keypad that stood just to the side of them. "Who the hell are you guys?" One of the Stormtroopers said upon seeing the two rebels.

"I have an unprocessed prisoner here." Buck said nodding towards Zack who still pretended to be handcuffed.

"All prisoners are accounted for! And why is your prisoner not in the detainee uniform!" The Stormtrooper said.

"Call command and report this." The other Stormtrooper said.

The same thought ran through both of Buck's and Zack's minds. They could not allow these two to contact the ship's head or they will not be able to escape. They reacted almost at the same time. Zack ignited his lightaber prompting one of the guards to shoot at him but he parried the shot away and cut the guard down horizontally. Buck shot the other Stormtrooper through the head before he could do anything.

"That was close." Zack said looking at the two dead bodies before him. "You okay?" Zack asked when he saw Buck looking at the bodies.

Many thoughts were running through Buck's mind when he saw the dead troopers. These men were his comrades not too long ago and now he was killing them. It was then that he came to realise that his former life was really over and that thought terrified him.

"Buck! Get your head in the game!" Zack said.

Buck snapped out of his deep thought. "Uhm... I'm okay."

"You better be because if you lose focus, you'll get us both killed." Zack scolded. "Make sure it doesn't happen again, Trooper."

Buck nodded.

"Let's look for the target shall we?" Zack said walking up to the keypad that was responsible for opening and closing the double doors. "What are the codes to opening this door?"

Buck stepped in and began typing in. "We should go to the holding area's data center to get the exact cell Ru' Bik is in."

"That sounds like too much work." Zack said. "It would be easier to just look for him." The doors slid open once Buck entered the full code into the keypad and revealed four floors with each level having over fifty cells. "I think you were right about the Data center thing. I'll look through the cells, maybe I can luck out and find Ru' Bik. In the meantime, you should go to the data center and try to make my search easier."

Buck nodded before running off. Zack stepped into the huge room. He ran past the cells on one side, pausing only to peer into them hoping to see Ru' Bik. However, eight cells down and he did not see the Vultan, instead he saw prisoners he did not know.

He decided to take this chance to contact Lona while looking through the cells. "Racer 1 to Diversity, come in."

"Racer 1, thank goodness!" Lona's voice said from the other side. "How are things going, Racer 1?"

"I'm currently in the holding area looking for Ru' Bik's cell..."

While Zack updated Lona, Buck ran to the data center. He opened the door to the dark room. The computer was sitting idly by and he began typing in it, looking for Ru' Bik's cell number. He thought it strange that the data center was unmanned but ignored it as he sort to accomplish the task at hand. When he got Ru Bik's cell number he contacted Zack.

"Racer 2 to Racer 1, come in." Buck said, exiting the room to join Zack.

"Yes, Racer 2." Zack said.

"The egg is in cell W-34." Buck said in code.

"Got it!" Zack said as he ran for the cell number. The letters went from Z to Y and so on until he got to the Ws. "Racer 1 to Diversity, come in."

"Racer1, did you find him?" Lona answered.

"Yes, Racer 2 came through. We have his cell num..."

/

In The Diversity Lona was listening to Zack's transmission until it was cut off and replaced by static. "Racer 1? Racer 1, come in!" Lona said into the communicator but only got static as an answer. She and Dyna exchanged nervous looks. "Racer 2, come in," Lona said, trying to contact Buck. Once again there was no response.

"What's going on?" Dyna asked.

"Our signal is being scrambled. I think they're on to us."

"What do we do?" Dyna asked the panic clear in her voice.

Lona kneeled down to Dyna's eye level and squeezed her shoulders reassuringly. "You're going to go back to Lona's Room and I'm going to go help them."

"No, I want to help..."

"No Dyna, you'll only get in the way." Lona said. "Just trust me, I'll bring them back."

Dyna reluctantly agreed and left for Lona's Room.

/

"Diversity? Diversity, come in?" Zack said as he was running to Ru' Bik's cell. He had lost contact with Lona and all he could hear was static. A cell door opened in front of him and out walked a Stormtrooper with his gun aimed at him. Another door opened behind him and there was another Stormtrooper.

Zack activated his lightsaber, preparing for a fight.

Buck was running back to the holding area entrance until he saw a large group of Stormtroopers marching there. Buck stopped as he realised that they were heading for Zack. Zack was in immediate danger. He remembered that in the holding areas there were two exits. He would have to open the other exit at the other side of the holding area to help Buck escape. Buck began making his way to the other side of the holding area.

/

Canoe was walking along the hallways of the Razmass when he received the signal that the Stormtroopers were to spring their well planned trap on the unsuspecting Rebels that had infiltrated the ship. He and a bunch of other Stormtroopers headed for the main entrance of the holding area. On the way to the holding area, another Trooper appeared from the far end. He was sprinting but as soon as he saw the other group of Stormtroopers, he began to jog. Canoe noted the trooper's armour: the dents, the scratches, the marks. He knew that armour! He stepped out of formation of the other troopers and stood in the path of the trooper heading in the opposite direction from them. The trooper stopped and they stared at each other, knowingly.

While Canoe and the other Stormtrooper stared at each other, the other Stormtroopers kept running until they rounded the corner. Except for the fading sound of the Stormtroopers, everything was quiet as Canoe stared down the other trooper. As soon as the sounds of marching officers completely faded away, they drew their blasters and pointed them at each other.

"Well well well, return of the traitor." Canoe said to his long time friend.

"Get out of my way Canoe," Buck said. "I don't want to hurt you."

Canoe gave a short snort, "You think you can take me on?"

"I don't think I can take you on; I know I can take you down."

/

Zack was surrounded. The Stormtroopers had not said anything so far; they had not demanded his surrender so he began to suspect that their intentions were not to take him in alive. He prepared himself for the coming life and death battle.

Zack charged at the soldier in front of him. He deflected a few shots before cutting him down diagonally. The other Stormtrooper came fast from behind him and he turned around to defend himself from his blaster shots. Zack moved closer and was able to cut his blaster in half. The trooper tackled Zack down to the ground, knocking his deactivated lightsaber away form him. The Stromtrooper straddled him while he pounded away at the rebel below him. Zack was able to push the trooper off of him. The man charged at him and he used The Force to recall the lightsaber to his waiting hand before running the trooper through the stomach with the green blade.

It was starting to dawn on Zack that this was a trap. He tried to contact Buck but all he got was static. He gritted his teeth as he realised that their communicators were being jammed. Her ran for Ru Bik's cell, hoping to free the Vultan so that they can make plans for escaping the deadly trap.

/

It was a stand-off between Canoe and Buck. Buck was the first to move as he shoved his gun into Canoe's in order to knock it away. to knock Canoe's away. Canoe used his palm to do the same to Buck's gun and both blasters landed in a pile some distance away. Buck punched Canoe away and ran for the blasters, where they had landed but Canoe grabbed his shoulders, spun him around and threw Buck behind him before he went after the weapons.

Buck got up and also ran for the blasters. He knew he would not make it to them before Canoe so he settled for stopping Canoe from getting them. He did a baseball slide where he kicked the guns away from Canoe. When Canoe reached down, instead of being rewarded with the blasters his hands were trapped within Buck's binding trapped Canoe's hands with his legs, Buck got up into a sitting position, after which he grabbed Canoe's head and flipped him over his head, making sure Canoe landed on his back. Buck tried to complete the manoeuvre with an arm lock since he had Canoe's arm trapped between his legs. However, Canoe was able to worm his hand out.

They both got up to their feet. Canoe whipped his hand to the side and hit Buck, however after the hit, Buck grabbed his arm. Buck began furiously elbowing Canoe in the helmet before slamming his body into the wall. Buck held Canoe in place while looking around for the blasters. Canoe was able to escape to the side and dodge an incoming punch. Canoe tried to punch Buck but he just blocked the punch.

They stood some distance apart in boxing stances. Buck threw two quick punches which Canoe dodged while getting under Buck's defences. Canoe was in an optimum position to throw an uppercut which he did. The uppercut connected and popped Buck's helmet off and made him stumble back. Canoe finished it off with a kick which sent Buck flying back onto his butt. Canoe ran forward and thrust his armoured knee into Buck's unprotected head.

Buck was stunned from the attack and it took some time for him to regain his bearings. When he did he saw a blaster aimed at his head by Canoe who was standing above him.

"You lose." Canoe said.

/

Zack stopped in front of Ru' Bik's supposed cell. He felt a darkness on the other side of the cell. The feeling made him apprehensive to open the door but he knew he had to, for Ru' Bik's sake. He clenched the hilt of the humming lightsaber tighter, as if to reassure himself that he could protect himself. He pressed buttons on the side of the cell which made its door open.

The cell was dark but there was obviously a figure sitting at the back of the confined space. Zack stood at the frame of the cell, reluctant to walk in.

"Ru Bik?" He said.

"No," a feminine voice said from the darkness as the figure at the end of the cell rose to its feet. Suddenly the dark cell room was bathed in red light from an activated lightsaber. A woman with a red lightsaber began walking towards Zack which prompted him to step back and hold his own lightsaber in a ready position as he slowly retreated. Saza stepped out of the cell, her figure being fully visible to Zack for the first time. She smiled at him. "I've been waiting for you," she said before she took a fighting position.