Ghost in the Arcade

[CaptainBonkers]

Apart from the few larger ones, the clankers pouring through the hangar doors were cheap security droids with glorified tasers for weapons and aiming software so poor that you almost felt bad staying in cover. It would have probably been a fairer fight if the lot of them just stood up and made themselves an easier target. Had it not been the few rustbuckets that were carrying heavier blasters, Jayec might have done so, if for no other reason than to mop the droids up faster. Truly, the only advantage they seemed to possess were sheer numbers and sheer lack of self-preservation instincts. Holding the hangar wouldn't probably be a problem. Unfortunately that was not their job here.

He fired a burst of blaster fire into the crowd of advancing droids, felling few out right and removing the legs from few others. They just kept crawling forward until someone else put them out of commission for good with a swift bolt to the head or, in Thel's case, a swift stab or slash with a glowstick. Despite of their efforts, there didn't seem to much slow down in the advance of the droids. Not until one of the Bes'galaar's turrets came to life and opened fire towards the hangar doors, scattering the droids trying to pour in. 

Jayec didn't stop to wonder what Farka had done to get the turrets operational. Maybe the pilot had rerouted power from the mergency life support to the weapons systems or something. It didn't matter. What mattered that there was now an opening they could push into and drive the enemy before them. He didn't hesitate for a moment. "Junior Squad! Hold the hangar! The rest of your; CHARGE!"

[Fromikeable]

Arcing electricity called forth by the Force. Crack shooting. The turret of the ship coming online. The sound of charging Mandalorians. All of it spelled doom for the makeshift droids as they practically evaporated under the onslaught, their cobbled-together pieces and scattered designs failing to work cohesively. That was all to say nothing of the green blade that was keeping step with the suits of beskar'gam, flicking in equal measure to block bolts and take slashes.

Vance refrained from yelling, though. He found himself in need of every bit of his breath.

The charge proved outrageously effective, the Mandalorians letting him keep just a step ahead as they began to build momentum. It wasn't for the sake of pomp; every door they came across was dismissed with a hand, the sound of screeching metal and tumbling shrapnel signaling that they didn't even need to stop running. Each hall held its own cadre of droids, every room its own squad. Each was dismantled violently in a matter of seconds.

The path they carved was meandering, if not short. Diving deeper into the station from the hangar, the Mandalorians lead the group on toward the heavier infrastructure on the station. Passing enormous greenhouses, their push came to a large bulkhead barred to the floor. A simple push hadn't been enough; it took Vance a solid thirty seconds of pure focus to rip the bars from their sockets before the door would yield.

What awaited them promised to be hell.

The room had clearly used to be some sort of hangar itself. Large bulkhead doors in the ceiling above sported Huttese warnings and language bathed in a faint glow from the few lights below. Walls of shelves and lifts were packed, but not a plant could be seen. Rather, every box lay full of everything a Hutt cartel could ever want; guns, drugs, credit chits, speeder parts, starship components, and every other vice imaginable to sentient kind. All of it was hard to see, however, given that the only lights in the room were small, moving, and red.

A klaxon blared as soon as the door landed. Along the floor, arranged haphazardly, a small army of droids began to come to life as the cranes within the room shuddered mightily.

Vance didn't even get to flick his saber before the gravity turned off, the entire station shuddering.

The droids went limp just as quickly as they had begun to rise, many falling over, some managing to get wild shots off. The entire hangar went pitch-black to boot, the klaxon going silent as the grave. The entire hangar went wild with weightlessness, crates and contraband of every kind rising aimlessly. It was all Vance could to reach out and grab the nearest solid object, the warped remains of the door, to keep from floating away. Activating his magnetic boots anew, he managed to regain his footing, looking immediately with confusion.

Seconds later, the station shuttered again. The hum of the gravity generators was the only signal of the incoming rain of metal and sin.

"Shit!" Vance could only swear as a droid whacked him in the face on its way down, his hands shooting up out of instinct. The things above him immediately began to divert their paths away from him and the folks around him, gaining a bit of horizontal speed in the process. It was only when everything had more or less settled that he managed to look back down, panting lightly.

"Why the hell are there so many droids on a damn agriculture station?" Venting more than he was expecting an answer, Vance caught his breath through a few short gasps as he looked around, hands braced on his hips. The hangar looked even worse now than before, with the many droids that inhabited it in various states of seizure on the floor. Most had been rendered harmless, save for a few that were kicking rather violently as a result of circumstance and damage combined.

Whether or not he wanted an answer, he received it. The klaxon renewed with ear-piercing volume as the ceiling shuddered, the bulkhead doors groaning. Pulling apart at a snail's pace, the atmosphere from the room began to drain as bright, blinding light poured from the new, growing opening in the ceiling. Even as sound disappeared with the air, the sight of what approached became obvious, the docking port of a massive ship coming closer to the opening hangar bay.

"Oh." The giant symbols on the ship's underbelly were clear. It was a Hutt cruiser, and mercenaries were already jumping out of its port toward the hangar below.

[Rugs]

The further in the assault went, the more Io’an became certain they were led into a trap.

They never found some entrancing computer bank with stores of untold secret data to be plundered. Io’an was sure it was there, but doubted more and more the information they’d find would be the sort they were after.

It wasn’t until they reached the old hangar — what figured to be just another stop on the way to their destination, according to the map — that the veneer of the “agricultural station” they’d invaded faded away. Weapons, vices, machinery. “What would they need all this for?”

Io’an looked around the room, his helmet lights filtering through the dusty air. The panning was more for the small camera built into his helmet that he’d set to recording once they finally made it out of their landing zone. Never knew when footage might be useful later.

Then the droids started stirring to life.

Then all the power died.

Io’an yelped as he drifted up without anything to grab onto. Visions of his own death, probably from drifting into something deadly in the dark, filled his head as he screamed wordlessly until one of the Mandalorians grabbed him and steered him to the wall with some finely-controlled jetpack bursts.

Then the power turned on and they fell to the ground in a pile.

“Thanks,” he muttered, rolling off of her. He thanked the Force that the helmet hid the blush he felt blossoming in his cheeks.

A ripple in the Force drew his focus away from that, from Vance’s vocalized frustration--from everything else as his stomach twisted itself into a pretzel. Something was coming, and it brimmed with life. Compared to the relative lack of life on the station besides the two teams, the ship’s arrival felt like a supernova against his senses.

He lost track of time as he fell into a silent panic, wondering what was coming for them. Were they going to die? How had this happened?

The hangar doors groaned open and the underbelly of a massive ship loomed beyond, drawing Io’an back to the present.

“Oh,” Vance said.

Io’an couldn’t have said it any better himself as the mercenaries dove toward their hangar. He lit his lavender lightsaber as three armored fighters landed in front of him, guns draw. A new sense of dread arose in his stomach, this one much more personal than primal.

“Do... do we have to kill them?”

[Meira]

Having never been part of anything resembling a military operation, Ylva found herself chuckling when Jayec shouted his order to charge the corridor full of droids. Even more so when the Mandalorian's fellows followed the order and rushed the doors. Perhaps part of her thought that such moments were holomovie fabrications. It was all a bit melodramatic. But she followed along as well, her heart pounding in her ears as the adrenaline kicked back in when waves of droids seemed to pour out of each door they passed. They pushed through like... well like a lightsaber through metal she supposed, watching how Thel cut the droids into scrap metal with his glowing green blade. The kid had style, that was for sure.

Soon, they found themselves in what appeared to be another hangar. Ylva stopped just inside the doorway, eyes scanning the room as well as they could in the uneven red light. Remembering her HUD, Ylva began to fiddle with her display and vision settings. She'd just managed to find the menu when the artificial gravity cut out.

"Woah!" she exclaimed. She did not immediately begin floating upward, but the sudden loss was disorienting. Her jerky movements, meeting no resistance, caused her to begin drifting. Luckily, a nearby wall allowed her some semblance of control. There were a few shots of blaster fire, but an additional loss of light made identifying where it came from impossible.

"The fuck is going on?!" she shouted, to no one in particular. This whole thing was getting a bit ridiculous.

A few moments later, however, the gravity kicked back in and Ylva slumped back to the floor. Her HUD, having cycled to a better display for the pitch black surroundings, warned her of the falling debris around her and Ylva pressed herself to the wall to avoid being hit. Up at the head of their group, Ylva heard Thel vocalizing his own frustrated question at their situation.

When the warning klaxon began to sound again, Ylva whirled, rifle ready and aiming back toward the door they'd come through. But no more droids followed them in. There were only the ones that had already been in the old hangar, and they were scattered and twitching like so many giant, dying insects. The overhead doors opening and the sensation of the atmosphere rushing out cued Ylva to look upward. She was in time to see the first of the mercenaries land among their group.

“Do... do we have to kill them?” Ylva heard Io'an ask as three of the mercenaries came to land near him.

Ylva, leveled her rifle toward them and moved up on Io'an's right. "If you like breathing, then probably." she replied.