Chapter 2
"Common we should hurry up!" The voice belonged to Anakin. The young Solo was looking at his fellow padawans, clearly impatient. They seemed to move ever slower as the target, aka the council room, came ever nearer.
"Oh common, Ani, we want to be careful. You never know what might be around the corner," Yulla said. However she sped up with Anakin.
"There's nothing up there. Luke said," Anakin urged.
"Actually, there is something coming into view on my map. It looks like a life form," Nick droned. "Oh joy. As if running down these halls wasn't exercise enough."
"Ya… It's on my map too," Ace exchanged glances with Anakin.
"Suppose we should get out our blasters and melee weapons," Anakin proposed to the group.
"Already been done," Ace looked around at his friends holding blasters or melee weapons. "The thing only looks like one person."
"That's good news," Yulla exclaimed batting her eyelashes at the boys.
Dent looked at them all, "We aren't in a good formation. Melee should go in font and remember the blaster blocking technique." He held his blaster up as Yulla, Ace, and Nick took the front holding their melee in the ready position. Anakin took up a spot next to Dent. "Why have they stopped at our checkpoint?"
Ace checked his map and saw a little red figure stop right before the entrance to the council, "I don't know but we'll find out soon. We are almost there."
Together they turned the corner and saw some alien thug standing at the key pad for the council room doors. It didn't take more than a second for Anakin to see that he was trying to hack in. The problem with this picture was that the alien was wearing republic clothing. "What are you doing?"
The alien looked at them petrified. To every one of the padawans the rest of the world went blank as each of them realized what he was doing. Dent shouted at the creature, "You're not a Republic soldier. You're working for the empire!"
In turn the creature said in its own language some thing that Anakin thought sounded very rude. Ace just seemed to be puzzled at the language than asked Dent, who seemed to understand the alien, "What did he say?"
Dent looked at his friends. Where eyebrows would have been on a human deep gashes appeared. The group knew this to be Dent's amazement. "Well," Nick pressed.
"He said that we won't be able to get to the council, blasted kids," Dent said to them.
"Well that's nice of him," Nick smirked. "I suppose he doesn't know who he's talking with. We have one heck of a mechanic on our hands." Nicks hand thumped Anakin on the back a few times.
The padawans looked back at the hacker who then blasted the keypad. What once had been a very high-tech computer system was now melted metal. There seemed to be no way to open the door now. Even if they contacted Leia and tell her they were on the outside she would not be able to open the doors from the inside. The whole system that worked the door would have been ruined with the alien's blaster.
Anakin looked from the alien to the door and back to the alien. When his gaze landed on the alien, there was no one there. A pit formed in his stomach. Where had the thug gone? Anakin looked up and down the long white corridor squinting for the thug. Turning to see what the others were doing Anakin saw that they were gazing transfixed at the spot where the alien was a second ago.
"He must have put on a stealth field," Dent murmured.
"Nah… That wouldn't have worked he would still show up on the computer." Nick said pointing to his arm band where the map was shining in the air. There were only five red dots on the floor (not counting the members of the council, now trapped).
"He must have vanished," Yulla said.
"He did vanish you star dust." Nick rubbed his temples in frustration.
"I think he might have used his stealth field than crawled into the hole right there," said Ace pointing to a hole at the end of the corridor.
"Blast it, he's got to be fast," Nick said while Dent whistled.
Anakin listened to his friends talk. After some time he finally interrupted, "Will someone tell me what exactly happened?" Though he thought he understood alright.
"Well the thug just disappeared. We're betting that he just put on his stealth field and crawled into that hole," Ace directed to dark spot near the corridors entrance. "I think that might have been a hole that the thug dug."
Just as Anakin had suspected. Walking over to the hole he examined it. "Looks like it would lead to the next level below us. My guess is he disguised himself as one of us, snuck in, could only go so far, than dug a hole the rest of the way."
"Sounds good to me Anakin," Ace said.
"I have a picture of him on my arm band," Dent interjected. "I could send it out to all republic people so he can't get out of here with out being discovered."
"Sounds good Dent," said Anakin.
"Now we just need to find a way to open the council doors," Nick said bitterly.
"No. . . . eh," Yulla brushed passed them. "First you see boys, we send a transmission to Senator Organa Solo. Next Anakin gets his shining moment to find a way in. He is after all very gifted with… what do you call them… I suppose computers is a good enough name."
Ace contacted his mother as Anakin set to work looking for a way in. He walked up to the door mechanism and put his hand up to it, almost touching it. The metal was still hot from the blaster shot at point blank range. He knew that if he wanted to fix it in time he would have to suck it up and burn his hands. He took a deep breath and focused his force energy. Then, as he slowly exhaled, he placed his hands on the molten metal, flinching only slightly at the first contact. Anakin closed his eyes and pictured the metal shaping back into the door mechanism. Behind his eyelids, Anakin saw the wires forming back together along with the metal reshaping. With the last bit of his energy, he opened the door.
"Yeah, mom. We'll be inside the chamber shortly," Ace's words slowed as he looked up to see the door open. "Never mind." As those words left his lips, Anakin slumped to the floor breathing heavily.
Nick saw Anakin's fatigue and smoothly walked over to his friend.
"Man that blasted me away. Seriously you've got some skill with the whole mechanic thing. It's sweet as a new hyperdrive. And I mean that," he gave Anakin a hand up. "Now, if you feel up to it your mom will probably want to hear 'bout this."
Leia was so proud of her sons. As the council stumbled out she gave hugs to Ace, Yulla, Dent, and then Anakin , followed by Nick. When she let go of Nick he said to her in a gloating tone, "We did it, Senator Orgona-Solo; It's all due to Anakin." He gave Anakin a push toward his mother giving his friend a slight smirk at the embarrassment trying to hide behind Anakin's eyes.
Yulla skipped over to them and tilted her head, "Yes, Ani, he did an amazing thing." She gave the young Solo a wink. "By himself he opened the door- see we ran in to a radical who blasted the key pad." Yulla pointed to the burn marks on the wall.
The rest of the council and stopped to overhear Yulla's story. When she finished Dent walked to t he end of the corridor and gave a shout for the council to follow. Slowly in procession Nick headed in the same direction with the crowd trying to give the Solo family, who were staying behind, some time alone. However Yulla didn't move from her spot where she looked tentatively from Leia to Anakin. Nick groaned and grabbed her wrist and started to drag Yulla away.
Ace remained behind with his brother and mother. Leia put a soft hand on Anakin's shoulder, "Ani. That's amazing. You really did that? I'm so proud of you. That's what you get from practice! Isn't it great? You are improving so much ohh… wait till Luke hears about this… and Mara! Your father will be proud, a little something in the force he can relate to." Ace realized that this was more or less a "mother to son" talk, not sons and jogged to catch up with the crowd just now turning the hall to another corridor.
Leia continued, "I am so proud of you my little Ani!" She gave him a hug.
Anakin raised his eyebrows at his mom, "Thanks mom, you really take the manly, heroic stuff out if it."
"Ani!" Leia joked. "I know what you mean… now, we better catch up with the group."
Luke and Mara headed to meet Han. He was leaning against the Millennium Falcon. "No need to fly. Their attacking mostly ground, you two," the brown haired man said.
"Really," Mara raised an eyebrow.
"So we should each take a group and lead them on the field," Luke offered.
"Ya, but I don't do your jedi battle meditation voodoo. So I prefer if you two keep to the com instead of communicating with each other by the creepy mind stuff. Really it would just help everyone."
"Got it," Mara waved the comment away as if she thought it stupid. "Now can we go kick some of those empire radical butts before we get old and die?"
The three of them were on the battlefield in the next couple minutes. Luke was amazed by the organization of what normally was a weak group of empire radicals who randomly attack only to be further weakened. A strange feeling aroused inside him as he tried to make some improvement on the field. The problem was Octel was not ready for this type of force drilling in to the fragile defenses. He made up his mind there as he watched his apprentice Rosto struggle. He touched his com link, hopefully, he thought, Dent might be able to come. He was, after all, the oldest and in this case they really needed help so after this, Luke figured, Dent will make it as Rosto's apprentice.
The group rushed toward the hanger. As they came closer to the door blaster bolts started to shoot at them. "How did they get in!" one of the council members shouted.
"Empire losers, who have nothing better to do than come up with lame strategies of getting in to secure area's, that's how." Nick explained in all earnest to the group.
They have Sonic Colds, Anakin thought as he saw a blast fire from the other end. He knew that Colds knock the victim out. Ace felt something stream past him and heard it hit the wall. Another flew past Yulla and hit Winter, then another hit Leia. The alien groaned and wrapped an arm around the unconscious Winter, Nick helped her. Dent went and lifted Leia up running to the front of the group. They were in a panic mode as Anakin messed with the door codes to get them in the hanger. Once in, he shut the door quickly.
"Not much time," a council member wined as she docked the fair flight. Others followed her on. Dent called for a pilot as he, Nick, and Yulla brought the two unconscious women aboard. "Why were they using stun guns?" Nick said to Dent.
Neither twin was paying any attention to this. They were watching the transmission appearing on the com links. It was Luke and he was asking for help. Anakin's eye widened and Ace's smile grew. They peered up at the people already docked. "Nick," Ace said. "Fly everybody back, Anakin and I will respond to Master Luke's plea. We got it. I mean…"
"Sure, sure… have fun," Nick said pretending to wave them off like a mother waving her children off.
The twins grinned and rushed out of the hanger using a different door than the one they came in from to avoid any blasters being fired at them.
General Quince watched the fight below from a nice seat on a mountain located to the left of the Octel field that most of the entertainment took place. This is just for fun, he reminded himself, and is it ever fun. Quince was proud to be the faction of the empire that was on the rise. They had a new Master now, who promised to restore the empire to its original glory. Certainly this sith could be trusted. Darth Ile admitted that he might use other factions, but none would receive as much power as Quince's. Quince stood up as he received a message from one of Darth Ile's followers. "You may pull out now, but My Lord wants prisoners."
So that is just what Quince did. He pulled his men out but commanded them to capture some prisoners if that was possible.
Anakin and Ace appeared at Luke's side when he had just met up with Mara. Rosto was behind him and gave a cough to give Luke a hint of their presence. Mara cursed when she saw them and Luke almost got hit by a blaster. "What are you doing here!?" he yelled at them.
"Helping you of course," Anakin said happily.
"Though I think we're late. Look, they seem to be retreating," Ace said.
"Yes, thank the stars! However, I did not ask for either of you. I know Leia would not have let you come out here so how-"
Anakin interrupted him, "Look that person's right under-" Anakin didn't finish because he was already running toward the person about to be squashed by a boulder falling from the top of the mountain. He pushed the person out of the way, without realizing they were one of the empire radicals. Before he could say another word, two arms wrapped around him and metal bands formed around his feet and hands. He saw the astonished and horror stuck faces of Luke, Mara, Rosto, and Ace before everything went black.
Ace saw the empire radicals capture his brother. Fourteen or so others quickly came to help their friend bring back the prisoner. Ace had half a mind to run over and try, try to save his brother but he knew that it was futile. Luke tried to run after them, to do anything for his nephew, but it was no use. There were just too many and he had to pull back to prevent from being captured himself. It just seemed unreal to Ace, where was his brother going to. It was his fault, he should have stopped his brother…. Somehow.
"It's not your fault, kid." Mara said, "He's rash, that's just who he is. Doesn't think- just does. If you want to blame yourself; blame us all. We'll get him back, Ace. He's a prisoner of stupid empire radicals, how far can he go… I mean it's not like their smart."
Rosto sighed, "Yeah, we can start looking for him once we get back to Corascant." He gave them all a helpless look, "I'm sorry for you Luke, and Ace. I mean it's hard for us but you two are family. I mean… who's gonna tell Han and Leia?"