Episode II - Full Stop - Part 3

The marine landing craft skimmed the surface of the planetoid. Bondi looked out the viewport, and noticed lumps of dirt and stone that seemed to protrude up from the surface and unnatural angles. The craft passed close to one, and Bondi noticed twisted metal, curled underneath the protrusions. The planetoid was a ship graveyard, and the corpses had been buried, probably by the killers themselves. How long had this installation been operational? How many ships had it pulled out of hyperspace to a certain doom, since the war had ended? Bondi rubbed his neck, feeling the scar that ran along his jaw. Here was another scar from the war.

“One minute to destination,” said the shuttle’s pilot, Marten. Bondi was snapped out of his reverie.

“Gear up, Imperial Marines!” he said, putting his helmet on. “We’ve got droids to kill.”

The shuttle had taken ten minutes to reach the hangar door, and had faced no resistance. Bondi considered it may have been a result of the pilot’s skill as much as anything – He’d kept the craft low, skimming the barren landscape. If indeed they were dealing with old Separatist Battle Droids, Bondi knew that their sensors could be confused by hugging the surface.

The shuttle swept its rear wings up into as the landing gear lowered, and touched down next to the large, unmarked metal circle that lay silent before them. The marines disembarked, and engaged their life support packs. The airless planetoid’s gravity was low, and the marines had to recall their training to avoid tumbling out of control as they bounded across the ground.

“Spread out, and find the release panel,” commanded Bondi. His men obeyed, scanning the perimeter of the door. Soon one of the marines, called Sims, called out: “Found it, sir.”

The squad converged on Sims. Bondi turned to his tech-specialist. “Get this door open, Booker” said the Lieutenent. Without a word, Booker knelt down and got to work. The rest of the marines stood in the darkness, scanning the horizon in each direction. From their position, the Bold Born was out of sight. Only the Sentinel landing craft stood out against the darkness and the jutting mounds of dirt and rock that Bondi suspected were all downed craft.

“How much longer?” asked Bondi.

“Just a moment. I’m past the first lock,” said Booker.

No sooner had he breathed his last word, than Sims called out an alert. “Contact!”

The squad spun. Rising from the ground, skeletal battle droids appeared about 100 feet from the hangar door. They were colored tan, with long, beak-like heads. Separatist grunts from the Clone Wars. As they rose, the droids began to fire on the exposed marines.

“Drop!” commanded Bondi. The squad dove to the ground to minimize their target profile. “Open fire!”

The approaching battle-droids shuffled forward in a line, typical of their type. They seemed exceptionally robotic, it seemed to Bondi, like they were just off the assembly line. Their fire was also erratic, but constant. The marines picked their shots and brought down the droids, but a new group was rising up behind them to take their place.

“Guess we’re registered as a threat now!” joked Booker between shots.

Bondi called back to the landing craft’s pilot. “Marten, take off and get a view of that droid hatch. See if you can shut it!”

“Yes sir,” answered Marten. The armed landing craft lifted off behind the marines. Some of the droids redirected their fire towards the vehicle as it swung around to face them. Marten opened up the forward blasters and took out three droids in one shot, knocking over two others, which picked themselves back up and continued to march forward, blasting away. Marten flew the craft over them towards the point that another squad of droids was emerging. These droids began firing at the landing craft immediately, and Marten could hear the reverberation of the blaster bolts hitting the lower hull shielding. The handheld blaster fire wasn’t enough to do any real damage, but Marten was smart enough not to feel overconfident. “I’ve got the hatch in view, sir. Looks like a service elevator. The door is wide open.”

Bondi looked up. Beyond the last couple battle droids being put down by his men, he could see the Sentinel hovering over twenty more droids, all firing up at the lander. Bondi rose and instructed his men to do the same. “Forget the hangar,” he said. “We’re going in the open door! Move.”

The marines pushed themselves to their feet and bounded across the distance, using the lighter gravity to their advantage. The opened fire on the battle droids as they approached, dropping them quickly. “Hold that elevator, marines! Booker, can you override the controls?”

“On it!” said Booker. He activated the wireless hacking tool on his wrist, tuning to the door’s channel like he had at the hangar. The initial locks were the same sequence, so he was halfway done as his squad and Marten in the lander finished off the droids on the surface. The elevator began to lower again to retrieve another set of droids, then froze in place. “Got it!” called out Booker.

“Good!” said Bondi. “Trank, place your mine!”

The demolitions expert ran up, kicking droid parts out of the way. He knelt down and placed an EMP mine in the center of the elevator platform. Imperial marines didn’t regularly carry droid-popper grenades anymore, but EMP mines based on the same tech proved to be useful in shutting down weaponry and machinery in a more focused way. “Done!” he said, retreating back to his squad.

“Booker, deliver our present,” ordered Bondi. “Marten, get the shuttle back a safe distance and land it, but keep her warm for dust off on my command. We’re gonna lose comms for a bit, but we should be able to raise you when we’re done. Stay alert.”

“Yes sir,” said Marten, and the landing shuttle peeled away above the marines, to get out of range of the electro-magnetic pulse blast radius.

Booker sent the order for the elevator to continue its descent trough his hacking tools. When it reached its destination, Booker let Lieutenant Bondi know. “In place,” he said.

“Trank, open the gift.” said Bondi.

Trank activated the mine, and a wave of energy erupted from the elevator hatch. The squad’s comms went down, as did their internal targeting displays. Life support was unaffected, as it wasn’t governed by electronic computations, though the measuring gauges went offline. Bondi used hand signals to direct his men to approach the hatch. They peered into the darkness below. Bondi signaled Trank to drop a concussion grenade into the hole, and Trank complied. The men stepped back from the hatch, and while they couldn’t hear the explosion, they felt the effects. Bondi then ordered his men to enter the hatch, so each marine stepped over the brink. The lower gravity again worked to their advantage, as they dropped a hundred feet and landed as if it was ten.

The lower platform revealed a devastated room of fallen droids. It looked like there were another fifty or so that hadn’t yet been deployed, now scrapped by the EMP and explosives. Bondi took no chances. He held two fingers to his head, indicating he wanted the squad to verify the droid’s were done. The men walked through the fallen ranks, popping any droids in the head that hadn’t had their heads separated from their frames by the concussion grenade. Bondi then pointed at the far wall, where the shadow of a door was barely visible. The men moved to it, but Booker’s hacking tools had not yet come back online, and the door itself was powered down. Bondi tapped Sims and Cord, his point man, on the shoulder, and the two big men attempted to pry the door open. As they did, the lights in the room came back on – The EMP effects were wearing off, and the facility was resetting the room. Sims and Cord stepped back. Bondi approached the door and touched the panel on the right of it. The door slid open noiselessly, revealing a short hallway separated by a translucent blue atmospheric shield. Bondi stepped in first, and his men followed. They stepped through the shield and out of the hallway, into a dimly lit, empty corridor.

Bondi removed his helmet, and drew a tentative breath. The air was stale, smelling of oil and ozone, but it was breathable.

“Alright, marines,” said the Lieutenant. “We’ve got to find the control center of this abomination. Comms are still down, but they should be back up soon. Looks like there are two directions we can take, so we need to split up. Booker, Cord; you’re with me. Sims, Trank and Peele, you go that way. I’ll bet that’s the way to the hangar we were trying to get in before. Secure it. I don’t want anything chasing us out of here.” Bondi looked directly at Trank when he said, “Anything.”

“Understood, sir,” replied Trank.

“Alright. Keep an eye on your comms. When possible, we’ll reestablish communication. Otherwise, meet back here in 30.”

The marines saluted, and then Sims’ team moved off in one direction, while Bondi and his men went the other. Bondi put his helmet back on, and saw the flicker of electronics coming back to life as the effects of the EMP mine wore off.