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I finally got some time to do some writing, it's not finished, but it's a start. I hope you enjoy:
The silence was ominous. A star ship in deep space was supposed to make some noise, the fact that the Iron Fist was dead in the sky was the most disturbing sensation Alexian Feemor had ever felt. His crewmates of two: Hadley Ortnall, the pilot and Trista Inard, the engineer were equally silent.
“What do we do now?” Trista asked breaking the thickening silence.
“You’re the grease monkey so go fix the bloody ship.” Hadley snarled, his large frame shifting in his chair. He scratched at his tattooed right bicep as he glared over to Alexian. “You should have known they’d bring a Connor net.
Hadley was referring to the electrically charged net that had ensnared their ship, temporarily shutting it down quicker than any blaster fire could. “I’m not a mind reader, Hadley.” Alexian replied trying to be less snappy, “Hutts aren’t usually this crafty. A Connor net isn’t exactly a cheap commodity.”
Hadley let out a grunt, “Point taken. But how do we get out of this freckin’ mess?”
Trista pulled her blonde hair back into a ponytail. “I’ll try and jump start the main drives, but it won’t get us out of the net.” She turned to look pointedly at Alexian, “Someone will need to go out on the hull and cut us loose.”
Alexian leant back against the co-pilot chair, “That net is still charged, I prefer to remain alive and breathing.”
Trista raised a neatly plucked brow, “Not all of us prefer your current status, Feemor.”
Alexian smirked at that, “I live to annoy others.”
Trista shook her head as she stormed off, “Don’t I know it.”
“Why would they use a Connor net?” Hadley huffed more to himself than to Alexian.
“It’s not the Hutts style, at least not for Gorba.” Alexian sat as he sat himself down in the co-pilot chair. He gazed out to watch the glistening Connor net. “How many ships were following us?”
Hadley sagged back in his chair, the leather creaked and strained. “Following us or firing at us?”
“I think they were all gunning for us, Hadley.” Alexian replied.
Hadley snorted, “I counted at least five.”
“So we should either expect to be blown to kingdom come, which I would have assumed would have happened by now, or we’re about to be boarded.” Alexian surmised as he fingered the side compartment of his chair.
As if to confirm his assumptions, the sound of metal grinding against metal sounded as the boarding tunnel attached to their outer hull access port. “Oh goody,” Hadley growled as he forced himself out of his seat, “time for some target practice,” he said as he pulled out his custom repeater rifle.
The pair stepped into the corridor leading to the access port. Both men were armed, Hadley packing as much as his bulky muscles could carry.
“Don’t use any thermal detonators,” Alexian said for good measure.
Hadley glared at him, “I’m not a moron. I know a thermal detonator could frag our hull.”
Alexian shrugged, “Sometimes you get caught up in the moment during a fire fight.”
Hadley rolled his eyes, “Then shut up and just let me shoot some fodder.”
Alexian wasn’t about to deny the man of such a thing. However their banter was cut short as Trista was shoved down the corridor with a blaster pistol barrel pointed at her temple.
“Gentlemen, please disarm yourselves,” an overly confident male voice instructed them. The humanoid was using Trista as a human shield.
Alexian turned to Hadley, “This guy actually thinks we like Trista?”
Hadley snickered, “What a tosser.”
At that moment, Trista stamped down the heel of her foot upon the toes of her assailant. She then elbowed him in the stomach before slamming her fist into his face. She twisted the blaster pistol from his hand and dug it into his jaw below his ear. “I told you these jerks wouldn’t care if you held me hostage.”
It took all of five seconds for Alexian to notice that the assailant was wearing an Imperial officer uniform and only two more to see that a squad of stormtroopers were barrelling down on them. “We got company!”
Hadley immediately opened fire, Alexian joining him as Trista stunned her assailant. She then ducked for cover behind a bulkhead and joined the fray.
“Is there a plan?” she asked sceptically.
“Yeah, don’t get dead,” Hadley shouted in response.
“Fabulous,” Trista sighed as she shot a trooper in the throat.
Eleven troopers went down before they started to realise that sheer numbers were not going to get them to their prey.
“They’re fanning out,” Alexian told.
“I noticed,” Hadley replied. “I’m going hunting white shell.”
“White shell?” Trista asked.
“Yeah that’s all them stormtroopers are, yella bellies in white shells that do sweet feck all.” Hadley smirked.
Trista turned to Alexian as Hadley stalked off, “You didn’t get a psych test done on him as a pre employment test, did you?”
Alexian shrugged, “I did I just wasn’t game to go past the first paragraph.”
“Idiot,” she muttered.
“That’s Captain Idiot to you. By the way, your psych test was extremely good reading.” Alexian taunted and got a rude gesture in return.
“So are we just going to sit around and shoot at these jerks or do you have something more creative in mind?” Trista asked as she fired off another couple of rounds.
Initially the sound of the ship powering up was disguised by the noisy fire fight. However Alexian didn’t miss the vibrating thrum of engines coming to life through the boots on his feet. The emergency lighting came on quickly afterward.
“Ship’s rebooted,” Alexian said with a smile.
Trista actually smiled in response, “Booby traps would be up, yes?”
Alexian’s grin only widened, “Oh yes indeed.”
The gurgled screams further down deck confirmed it.
“We still can’t go anywhere with that net attached,” Trista pointed out as they backed towards the cockpit.
“I’m still not going out there to remove it. I’ll try the service droids instead.” Alexian said as his fingers stroked the console with speed and grace. “Done, they’re up and running.”
“Won’t the net interrupt their circuitry?” Trista said as she checked the monitors.
“Now that they’ve rebooted that won’t happen, as they’ll have adjusted their systems for such additional shocks. They might power down for a minute or so but they’ll be back up much quicker.” Alexian told as he watched the droids work. They had already started cutting through on four aligning quadrants.
Alexian turned to the radar, “What the heck? I thought the Imperials must have scared off the Hutts, but both Imperial and Hutt spacecraft are surrounding us.”
“That makes no sense,” Trista replied. “We’re not even carrying cargo.”
“Did you majorly tick someone off and not tell me?” Alexian asked Trista.
“What me? Little Miss Popular couldn’t possibly be the cause of this much attention.” Trista said with dripping sarcasm.
“What did you do?” Alexian asked as he prepared the outer guns for battle.
Trista shrugged, “I might have killed an Imp I shouldn’t have.”
“Feck, do you have a bounty on your head?” Alexian said growing more frantic at the controls.
“Hmm only a small one, the best they could get was Jodo Kast.” Trista said sounding somewhat disappointed.
“So why do we have Imperials and Hutts after us?” Alexian said with more patience than he felt.
“I might have stolen some access codes that both parties are interested in.” Trista told as she fired a few shots down the corridor. “You might want to get us out of that net. I have a feeling the Imps are going to send in some of the heavy artillery soon.”
“The Imps and the Hutt are also pounding each other. It’s the only reason we haven’t been completely swarmed upon.” Alexian said as he completed the hyperdrive syncing.
“Thank your lucky stars then. Shall I go and help Hadley? I don’t want him having all the fun. You know how much he gloats when he gets the top body count,” Trista pouted.
Alexian signed, “Fine go play hunt the trooper.”
“Thanks,” Trista smirked as she ran down the corridor enthusiastically.
Alexian saw that the droids were almost through the net. Alexian’s other concern was tractor beams. He’d already adjusted the settings for a quick series of hyperspace jumps but they had to get away first.
An alert beeped to confirm that the droids had done their work. Alexian immediately shifted into action. He steered the ship away from the net’s remains and hit the hyperdrive initiation button.
Immediately warning claxons blared and stopped the ship from making the jump. The access port that the Imperials had used to board was still open. Alexian thumbed the internal com system, “Get this tin can sealed, now!”
Within minutes the claxons stopped. Hadley’s voice came over the internal com, “Hatch sealed, all go.”
Alexian didn’t waste any time, the Hutts had seen their attempt for escape and were trying to manoeuvre into their path. “Not on my chrono, buddy,” Alexian growled as he readjusted their trajectory. Once it was down he activated the hyperdrive and was rewarded with the streaking lines of hyperspace.
Flicking the auto pilot on, Alexian got to his feet. “Time to clean out the trash,” he muttered to himself as he headed out to help Hadley and Trista with the remaining Imperial intruders.
He didn’t have to go far before he found a clutch of troopers hiding behind some crates firing at either Trista or Hadley. Thankfully they were so absorbed in their current task that they didn’t even see him coming. Within six shoots all troopers were down and out.
“Aw man, I only needed four more to beat Hadley,” Whined Trista from the other side of the room.
“Is that all of them?” Alexian asked, not caring about Trista’s disappointment.
“Yeah, Hadley is currently stacking the dead ones into crates to shoot into space.” Trista told.
A shout echoed from further down the ship, “Who said they’re all dead ones going into the crate?”
“You’re a sick piece of work,” Trista shouted back.
There was a chuckle, “And you love me for it.”
“As much as haemorrhoids,” Trista snarled in response.
The laughing only got louder. Trista chose to ignore it, “So now what?”
“We need to search for any tracking devices,” Alexian said as he headed back to the cockpit.
“Where’s the Imp officer I stunned? I’ll go and extract the information out of him.” Trista said with a dark relish.
Alexian left her to it as he returned to the cockpit to do a full scan of the ship. The sensors didn’t pick anything up but that didn’t mean that there wasn’t anything aboard.
Hadley trudged up to the cockpit. A sheen of sweat was covering Hadley’s exposed arms as he returned his weapons back into their normal storage spaces. “Ship is clean, the white shells are ready for launch,” Hadley said with a smirk.
Alexian raised a brow, “What you’re putting your weapons away without cleaning and reloading?”
Hadley laughed as he slid heavily into his seat. “Already done,” he rumbled.
“I see killing has put you in a good mood,” Alexian commented as he got ready to open the rear cargo bay to dump the dead troopers.
“Always does,” Hadley said in response.
Trista sashayed into the cockpit, “The officer is out cold but I found a tracking bug in his clothes.”
“I hope you disposed of it,” Alexian said as he turned from the console.
“What do I look like, a twit?” Trista snapped.
“I thought you looked more like a rancor,” Hadley sneered.
Trista hit him up the back of the head with the palm of her hand.
Hadley rubbed his shaved bald head where Trista hit him, “Watch it, you’ll ruin my hair.”
“Find anything else?” Alexian asked before a brawl started.
“Only a nice set of abs,” Trista said with a satisfied grin.
“Yuck, go drool somewhere else,” Hadley snapped as he turned back to his console.
Trista turned back to Alexian, her mood sobering, “Do you think they followed us?”
“Depends on how valuable they think we are,” Alexian replied looking at her pointedly.
“Jodo Kast is hardly top notch in the realm of bounty hunters.” Trista said in response.
“Yeah but we’ve just slipped the noose, they might up the bounty now, we’re not an easy catch.” Alexian said as he ran a hand through his dark hair.
“I’ll get worried when Boba Fett is hired,” Trista said as she moved to her seat.
“Boba Fett,” Hadley spat with contempt, “He’s a pussycat.”
“Now I know you’ve been hit too many times on the head. Boba Fett is a threat not to be underestimated.” Trista said, punctuating her words with a pointed finger at Hadley.
“Yeah but as far as we know, we’ve got to worry about Imperials, Gorba the Hutt and Jodo Kast. I think our plate is full enough without adding Boba Fett to the equation.” Alexian said drily.
Trista shrugged as she looked at her nails, “Damn tore another one to the quick.” Her attention returned to Alexian, “Where are we headed?”
“Now that is a surprise,” grinned Alexian, “and we’re almost there.”
