Mission Log

Episode XIII: Capture

Date: 37:9:8 - 37:9:14

After the success of their last raid, the Hammer and her crew returned to the Waypoint station to meet with an Alliance vessel to transfer the captured cargo and prisoners from the Gold Dust. About the same time that Alliance vessel arrived, Kethan received a message from Syl that explained that he had received information from an Alliance agent on Shipar, inviting them to meet the agent in the Twilight Club on Shipar to discuss a potential target. Keen to keep the cash coming in, the Nova Dragons agreed to accept the invitation and decided to set off once the cargo transfer was completed.

Since the operation would initially call for a team to land on Shipar and meet the agent, Kethan decided to travel in the Bindfast as its identity was still clean. He also chose to take a reasonably sized team just in case anything went awry and comprised of Raggy, Chaide, Samic, Dallarra, Alyssa, JD, Krib and Kal. Since they didn’t know how quickly they would need to mobilise to hit the target it was also decided that the Hammer would travel to the edge of the system and await word from the ground team...

 ********

After safely landing on Shipar, the Nova Dragons proceeded through Imperial Customs and were scanned for blasters. Thankfully, Samic had done his work up front and discovered that this was a standard procedure, so consequently none of the Nova Dragons were carrying any blasters. JD, however, was left aboard the Bindfast due to the risk of him being identified as an Imperial deserter, particularly as he didn’t have a clean fake identity.  

It was mid morning by the time they found themselves standing in street outside the starport and they decided that the first port of call would be to locate the Twilight Club. Once they found the club they went in search for a nearby hotel and ended up booking themselves into the Hotel Garem. After they had settled into their rooms the Nova Dragons got together in Samic’s Penthouse suite to discuss their rendezvous with the Alliance Agent. It was decided that they would split up into two groups so that they didn’t draw too much attention to themselves. The first group, comprising of Kethan, Raggy and Kal, would meet with the operative whilst the second group would try and draw the attention of the other patrons. Samic would lead this second group and would take on his former role as a fashion designer - naturally a very colourful and flamboyant designer, the likes of which only Samic can achieve!

With their plans laid down, Samic set about making arrangements for himself and his entourage, whilst Chaide went to the club itself to check out its facilities and security under the guise of Samic’s bodyguard. Most of the others either got roped into helping Samic out or went and took in the sights of city...

 ******** 

At 8.00pm local time, Kethan, Raggy and Kal arrived at the still quiet Twilight Club allowing them some time to case the place before the agent was due to arrive. At the appointed hour, and as instructed in the message from the agent, they selected table in the restaurant section of the club and ordered a local specialty, Japti stir fry and some Old Frosty ale. 

Shortly after their meal had arrived, Samic and his entourage pulled up outside the club in a hired Chauffeur driven luxury speeder. Stepping out of the speeder with Alyssa and Dallara draped on each arm and clothed a garish multicoloured satin outfit Samic looked the part as a famous fashion designer. His entrance into the club turned most of the heads in the club and the reactions varied from shaking heads to dropped jaws. Leading the way Samic selected a prominent table in the lounge area of the club. With their distraction and backup now in place, Kethan, Kal and Raggy felt more at ease and continued to enjoy their meal. 

Once their meal was finished a waitress came and cleared their table. As she left, a rather bland looking male human approached the table and asked them if they had enjoyed their meal and if they visited the Twilight Club often. Knowing that these were the expected code questions, Kethan replied with the corresponding answers. Nodding his head the agent offered his hand and introduced himself as Jae Wollen. Following the introductions Jae pulled up a seat at the table and started chatting about local news and events. So deeply did they get involved in the conversation that all four of them failed to notice two speeder vans pull up outside the club. They also failed to notice a group of armed men getting out of one of the vans... 

Just as he was getting to the point of telling them about the potential target Jae suddenly developed an itch on the back of his neck. Aware that similar itches had saved him in the past he sprang to his feet... 

At that moment, a squad of COMPNOR troopers stormed into the club, cutting the music to an abrupt end. Panic followed and smattering of screams went up. Seizing the opportunity, Jae scrambled for the nearby stairway through a set of doors. As he past through the doors he turned to the stunned Nova Dragons and held the door open for them. Meanwhile the COMPNOR Troopers were making their way through the now quiet crowd towards Kethan’s table. 

Kethan, now recovered from the initial shock, decided to stay where they were so that they appeared to be innocent bystanders. Jae, realising Kethan’s decision, turned and fled up the stairs. As the Troopers closed on the table, half of them split off and pursued Jae up the stairs, whilst the other half of the squad then arrested Kethan, Kal and Raggy on the grounds of conspiracy. Once manacled, they were escorted towards the back of one of the speeder vans. All the while, Samic and the rest of the Nova Dragons looked on in dismay.  

Chaide, no longer taken aback, suggested that they should leave the club immediately and follow the Speeder Van. Agreeing, the Nova Dragons left the club and managed to get to their hired speeder just as the speeder van pulled off. Whilst everyone clambered into the back of the speeder, Chaide tapped the window to speak to the Chauffeur. Man in the driver’s seat was not their original Chauffeur... 

As Chaide was reeling from this, the mysterious driver said “Chaide, I’m Sam, a friend of Jae’s. Get in and I’ll explain on the way”. Whilst not entirely happy with this strange turn of events, Chaide complied with his request and got into the speeder. As the speeder pulled off in pursuit of the speeder van, the privacy window separating the cockpit and the passenger section lowered. Sam introduced himself as a Rebel Agent who worked with Jae and that he was the look out for tonight’s meeting. He also explained that COMPNOR had used some comm jamming equipment preventing him from alerting Jae of the impending danger. Suspecting that the worst might happen Sam had decided to acquire their hired speeder. At the Nova Dragons’ questioning glances, Sam also explained that the Chauffeur was fine, albeit that he would have a headache in the morning... 

******** 

Minutes into their journey and less than happy with their current situation Kethan and Kal were trying to think of a way out of their predicament. Raggy, however, was somewhat quiet with distance look in his eyes. Moments later, with seemingly little effort, Raggy pulled his manacles apart and set to work on freeing Kethan and then Kal. Despite being free of their manacles, they were still somewhat trapped. Again, Raggy seemed to have the answer - without saying a word he ripped the rear door off the speeder van and hurled it on the road. The COMPNOR driver must of heard the racket being made in the back and foolishly decided to pull over to check out what was going on...     

Meanwhile, Sam decided to take a short cut through some side alleys to head the speeder van off. In the back of the speeder the Nova Dragons started to arm themselves with the weapons Sam brought along in his bag. A few minutes later Sam exited an alley onto a seemingly quiet street and it was then, as he pulled around the corner, that he beheld a very unexpected site indeed. Up ahead of them the speeder van had pulled over to the side of the street and its three prisoners were running away from the vehicle directly towards them. Somewhat taken aback, Sam brought the speeder to a stop. It was then that the blaster fire started. 

Blaster fire from the speeder van’s turret and driver rained down amongst the three prisoners as they fled from captivity. In fact, so intent on their escape were they that they did not notice the speeder ahead of them until the passengers got out of the vehicle and started laying down suppressive fire at the Imperials behind them.  

As recognition dawned on Kethan’s face, a powerful blast from the speeder van punched a gaping hole in the Nova Dragons’ hired speeder’s engine housing. With speeder now useless Sam led the group down a nearby alley way and up to the roof of one of the buildings using its external fire escape ladders. Kal, bringing up the rear as usual, had just got to the top of the fire escape when blaster fire, missing him by bare millimeters, sprung up from the two COMPNOR troopers in the alley way below. Wasting no time the Nova Dragons headed off across the roof tops. 

Thanks to their reasonable head start and the ill fortune of one of the COMPNOR troopers as he tried to jump across an alley way, the Nova Dragons managed to break contact with their pursuers and headed to Jae’s and Sam’s hideout via a very elaborate route. 

The somewhat winded Jae had already arrived by the time they turned up and was in the middle of packing up his gear. Jae’s cover had been broken and it was time for him and Sam to leave. On hearing this, Kethan immediately offered to smuggle them off planet, which Jae and Sam gratefully accepted.  

Acting quickly, before COMPNOR could consider locking down the starport, they infiltrated the starport and boarded the Bindfast. Kethan then logged a request to leave with starport control, which was promptly granted and with a huge sigh of relief the Bindfast safely departed the system.  

Captain’s Log:               

<<37:9:14/NOV.DRA/CAP.LOG/>> 

Strange, I looked back at my last entry before I began writing this. To see my words of just a few short days ago. Pride in a job well done. That seed of hope that was showing green shoots, the Empire IS showing the strain. We ARE invincible! 

How wrong could I have been? How arrogant. Yes it's true, we've had a remarkable run of successes since the inception of Project Hammer. Enough that the program is to be expanded. How I pontificated during the interviews, grand words and splendid visions. Syl and I did stress the importance of planning, training and hard work. 

So what went wrong on Shipar? If you look at the barest facts, we suffered no casualties; we even assisted two Rebel agents to escape the planet after their cover had been blown. Many might call that a success. Not me. I was there. 

The premise was so simple. Turn up on planet, meet a contact, pick up some information and do a job. Easy. Where did it start to break down? Well, we had advance intelligence of a fairly tight Imperial security set up at the spaceport. Nothing outrageous, but perhaps tighter than we've dealt with in a while. So whom did we decide to include in the team? JD. No knock on JD, his skills were amongst those we could well have required, but both Chaide and I have both known for a long time that there is an Imperial bounty on his head for desertion. So what possessed us to ignore that knowledge? 

We were smart enough to carry out a scouting operation on the venue for the meeting. OK, so maybe Chaide didn't get to see as much of the place as he might have liked, but we knew the area we were headed into. We had a plan. I'm still not convinced it was a bad plan, but the execution..? Where for example was our fall back position? I cannot believe I didn't sit down with Chaide, and Alyssa, and work out a contingency. But oh no, in my smug security blanket of unlimited success, what could go wrong? We are the Mighty Nova Dragons! We are infallible! If only that were true. Perhaps this war would end and we could go back to normal lives. We knew that our man would be there all week; we could have back trailed him, to check he wasn't being tailed. Maybe those ISB agents were that good that we wouldn't have spotted them, who knows what would have happened because we chose to live in the shadow of our own legend. 

Once I had made contact, once the COMPNOR agents started pouring into the places with guns and threats, what possessed me to stay and talk to them! My mother always said my smart mouth would get me into trouble one day. At least I have the consolation of being able to tell her she was right. At that moment in time it seemed so clear to me what I had to do. I felt no fear. The Jedi code, quite rightly, teaches that fear leads to aggression and the Dark Side. I shouldn't have needed fear to tell me that once my initial blandishments had been quite thoroughly ignored, there was no reason to stay. Whoever originally wrote that discretion is the better part of valour was possessed of a deep wisdom. Have I really been able to surround myself with such an aura that neither Kal nor Raggy felt compelled to disabuse me of my nonsensical notions? On the one hand such deep trust is very gratifying, but to maintain that trust I need to make better decisions than to repeatedly try to talk down some of the most xenophobic fanatics in the galaxy. Especially when the guy they came to arrest was rather politely holding open the door to our escape route. 

So how did we survive? In part, perhaps the Force had conveyed enough power to my words that the COMPNOR agents thought I was simply a mad man, in need of questioning, certainly. I had been seen in the company of a known Rebel agent, reason enough even had I truly been innocent. Also I was blessed to be accompanied by colleagues. By friends. And, let's face it, with a Wookie by your side, nothing is ever quite as bleak, quite as without hope. And at least I was able to avoid dragging the rest of the team in immediately. If nothing else, they could escape. A commander’s first duty is to the men and women under his command. To have that command, to a one, come after you armed with little more than a grim determination, prepared to take on fanatics carrying blasters. It's an honour I'm not sure I deserve. 

Details of our escape from the prison van shed little light on anything except perhaps the one hope that I cling onto, the one hope that has prevented me from resigning from my position. When all seemed lost, no one gave up. There HAD to be a way out. Nova Dragons don't leave anyone behind. When JD was captured these many months past, our first thought was to rescue him. When Raggy, Kal and I were arrested, there was no generalised panic, no thought of abandoning us to our fate. It is this sense of unity that rises phoenix-like from the ashes of the debacle on Shipar that rekindles my hopes for the Nova Dragons. With such spirit men can move mountains. With such spirit tyrants can be toppled. 

I still wear one of the wrist cuffs, I will do for some time to come. Oh, certainly, I've had Samic disguise it to simply look like a piece of jewelry, but I know what it is. What it symbolises on so many levels. The circle, perfect unity. The binding, failure is never more than a heartbeat away. The closure, I need to remember to just shut the hell up from time to time! 

-Captain Kethan Falor