Chapter 20

A former Stormtrooper stood at the top of a small rocky hill. He had his arms folded while looking at the shadowy structure in the far distance. The structure was the Ekadi Prison facility and it was the place where his goal laid. Zack appeared, walking up the rocky hill to join him.

"Don't think too deeply trooper." Zack joked. "Or your head will grow too big for your helmet."

Buck acknowledged Zack with a nod before returning his gaze to their ultimate target. "It feels like this is our last chance." Buck said. "Either we succeed or..." Buck sighed, reluctant to voice out the multiple possibilities of what would happen if they failed.

"This is our last chance." Zack said also staring at the shadow on the distance. "But at least we have a better chance than we had last time. We do have an army of little men behind us." Zack said looking at the direction of the village of Cloubits.

"Are they done with their preparations?" Buck asked.

"Almost." Zack said. "But we are moving out in a few hours. With the Cloubits knowledge of the land we should arrive at Ekadi Prison in no time."

Buck took his helmet and put it in on his head. "Then let's get ready to go." He said looking at Ekai Prison.

/

"This can't be correct," The operator inside the control room said.

The prison warden came over to him. "What's the matter?"

"Sir, Supply Ship EEZ-3 is asking for permission to enter past the planet defences." The operator said.

The warden pulled at his goatee. "Is that not the supply ship that came by a rotation ago but never landed on the base?"

"Yes it is." The operator said. "We've done scans and like the previous ship, it checks out."

"Seems you've been tricked, Warden." Saza said, walking in from behind them. Following in her wake was Canoe. "It's obvious that one of these ships is a false one but I suspect it is the first one."

"Send TIE fighters to escort this ship to the base." The Warden said.

"I'd also suggest that you send out a patrol to look for the other ship." Saza said before turning around on her heels to leave.

"Yes ma'am." The Warden said, resisting the urge to sigh. He still remembered that Saza had commandeered his office which was making his life very hard.

Saza stopped beside Canoe and smiled with sinister, "See? I told you they would come. I hope you're ready to do what you have to do when the time comes." Saza said before walking away and out of the control room.

Canoe could not help sigh as he saw the green dot that represented the newly arrived supply ship. Canoe had hoped that Buck would not do something as idiotic as come to Ekadi. Maybe there's still a chance that Buck is not involved in this, Canoe hopefully thought to himself. Oh, who am I kidding, with my luck, Buck is leading the damn thing!

/

Buck and Zack joined Kisto with the rest of the Cloubits. The village was standing around a Cloubit body that was being cremated.

"You guys have come back." Kisto said.

"I thought we were heading out." Buck said.

"There doing a... 'war funeral'." Kisto said. "The elder Cloubit told me that the death of the young Cloubit would mark the end of their oppression, since he was the last to be killed by the Stormtroopers before they decided to wage war."

"What?" Zack said as the Cloubits began singing. "But isn't that the Cloubit that I..."

Kisto held his hand up to keep Zack form speaking. "Right now, there's no need for them to believe any different, especially since we'll be allies in this fight."

Zack nodded and Buck stayed quiet but he got the gist of what happened to the Cloubit boy.

After the war funeral, most of the Cloubits left with the rebels, leaving few behind to tend to the ones too old and young to fight. The fighting Cloubits took spears, sharp rocks and some carried large logs in groups. This was all in preparation for the attack on Ekadi.

/

The convoy of warriors walked together in the rocky land. They had to enter a tunnel which needed them to walk in twos to fit. The tunnel acted as a concealed short cut that ensured that they did not have to climb up the rough and often inclined terrain.

Buck was the first rebel to exit through the cave exit; of course he was preceded by a few Cloubits as some of them led the way. As soon as he stepped out of the mouth of the tunnel he was tackled to the ground by two Cloubits. His hand instinctively reached for his blaster but stopped when the Cloubit gestured for him to calm down and remain still.

Understanding the Cloubits request, Buck did as he was beckoned and remained still. He was rewarded with the sight of two ships flying past overhead, having not seen him because of the outcropping rocks surrounding them. Buck breathed a sigh of relief as he spied on the ships disappearing in the horizon. He looked back at the Cloubits that had tackled him and nodded his thanks.

Kisto and Zack also followed a few standard minutes later. Buck explained to them what had happened and the news seemed to worry Kisto the most.

"This is bad," Kisto said in deep thought. The Twi'Lek rubbed his chin as he mauled over what the appearance of the two patrol ships meant. "If they are sending out ships, that means they're looking for ours."

"Why would they be looking for our ship?" Zack asked.

"Remember we used the signal of a supply ship that we confirmed was on its way here." Kisto said.

"Oh! That supply ship must have arrived..." Zack said in realisation.

"And now our cover is blown." Kisto completed his sentence. "

I guess we've lost the element of surprise... again." Buck said.

"Not necessarily." Zack said. "All they know is that a ship conned its way past their defences but they don't know it's us. And even if they did, I don't think they'll be expecting us to bring in a small army."

"Hmm, Zack makes a good point." Kisto said.

"Rebels, you stay behind!" The elder warned before turning his back and joining the flow of the Cloubits.

The three rebels decided to end their meeting and catch up to the Cloubits.

/

Some of the Cloubits had gathered around something. Buck approached them slowly so as not to scare them off. He was still getting murderous looks from some of the Cloubits as he wore the unform of their sworn enemies so he had to be careful around some of them. He approached the group and ignored the sneers, or at least what he thought were sneers, from some of the Cloubits. He saw that they had surrounded Elder Rubit and were helping him to his feet.

"Are you okay, Rubit." Buck asked with concern.

"Yes. I fine whi... Buck." Rubit said getting to his feet and continuing his walk while some of the Cloubits flanked him protectively.

"I don't understand why you're coming with us, Rubit." Buck said. "Won't you be uhh..." Buck tried to find the right words without sounding insulting, "in too much danger during the battle."

Rubit gave a coarse laugh. "I only one, who speaks Basic. You need me."

Buck nodded. He saw some of the Cloubits diverge from the main group to take a different path. "Where are they going?" Buck said nodding towards the fast disspaearing group.

"They get other... livers on planet." Rubit said.

"Livers?" Buck repeated the word. "Oh, you mean people who live on the planet. Inhabitants."

"In-Inhabitants." Rubit repeated the unfamiliar word. "Yes, inhabitants."

So there'll be more Cloubits to join us, that's good. Buck thought to himself.

/

The group reached Ekadi prison undetected and quickly thanks to the Cloubits extensive knowledge of the land. The small Rubit looked up at the tall wall that reached far above any Cloubits head. In fact, the wall reached far above even the three rebels' heads.

"This is going to be quite a climb." Zack said.

The Cloubits produced long logs they placed the wooden logs against the imposing grey wall. Cloubits and Zack began climbing up three logs that had been set up. One of he Cloubits got on top of the log and looked up at the distance that was left to climb to. The Cloubit threw a rope to hook the top of the wall. When it used its legs to brace itself for the climb, it was electrocuted, causing it to fall off the log to its death.

Zack seeing this was very careful and heard Cloubits clicking and making noises which he assumed were orders for the Cloubits to stop. "Gees, thanks for warning me too." Zack said sarcastily as he began to climb down the log.

"The wall is electrified." Zack said looking at Kisto. "Didn't you know about this."

"The rebels knowledge about this prison is still heavily lacking." The green Twi'Lek said approaching the wall. He reached out which caused the Cloubits and Buck and Zack to gasp. Kisto touched the wall and flinched at the pain caused by the electricity flowing into his body through his arm. He kept his hand there for a few more moments before he took his hand away. "It looks like the voltage increases the higher you go. At this level it's painful but not fatal."

Under his red dirt stained helmet, Buck had his mouth agape. "So you weren't sure about that and just decided to put your hand there?" He shouted.

"I was testing a theory that I knew was most likely true." Kisto shrugged. "I've seen something similar to this wall before."

"We retreat to safe place for new plan." Rubit said as most of the Cloubits had taken down the logs and began walking away.

Kisto nodded and they followed the village.

/

"We'll need a new plan." Kisto said. "We can't expect our forces to scale the wall and not be discovered or killed."

"We could blow the wall up." Zack suggested. "I'm sure we're packing enough explosives to do it."

"I don't think we should risk it." Buck said. He had his helmet off to ease Rubit and some Cloubit warriors who were sitting in on the war meeting. "If we go in hot then we can get easily repelled by the prison forces."

"I agree. Do you have any ideas on how we can enter?" Kisto asked.

"Matter of fact I do." Buck said. "If a few of us can sneak in and cut the power off, we could make the wall safe for climbing for the rest of our forces."

"And then the rest of our forces can sneak in and attack." Zack completed his thoughts.

Buck nodded in agreement.

"Good plan but remember that the prison cells are operated by electricity." Kisto said. "If we take the power out then there's no way to free the prisoners."

"Then we'll free them after we take the base." Zack offered.

"If we take the prison." Kisto corrected. "Even with our forces as they stand now, we still have the odds stacked against us."

"The Cloubits will fight and win!" Rubit said which made Zack smirk.

"You heard Rubit, we can do this!" Zack said.

"Forgive me Rubit. I meant no insult but I just want to increase our chances of winning." Kisto said. He drew a square and a circle around the square to represent the prison with its wall. "My original plan was to free the prisoners and arm most of them, most preferrebly the rebels and not whatever other criminals they have there, and start a two prong attack. One with our forces here attacking in and the other with the prisoners inside attacking out." Kisto said drawing an arrow from the square pointing to another arrow on the wall, which was pinted to the square."

"I think that can still be arranged." Buck said. "There are systems made to divert power from some sections of the prison to another. If we can divert the power from the wall we can give the Cloubits a chance to invade."

"Do you know how to do that? Do you know how to operate the prison's systems to achieve such an effect?" Kisto asked skeptically.

Buck kept quiet as he hesitated. "We'll find a way!" Zack spoke up for him.

"You are way to optimistic, Zack." Kisto scolded.

"Its not optimistism, its confidence." Zack said.

"Buck, talk to him." Kisto said.

Buck smiled at Zack. "Yeah, we'll find a way," he agreed with his crew member.

Kisto sighed loudly. "Fine." He reluctantly agreed to their crazy plan.

"If you enter place then you take two Cloubits and one of you must stay." Rubit said.

"I'm not staying!" Both Zack and Buck declared simultaneously.

Kisto rolled his eyes at that. "Fine, I'll stay with Elder Rubit."

Buck nodded his head. The Cloubits had seemed to like or tolerate Kisto better than he or Zack.

"Let's get ready to storm the prison." Kisto said.