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| - Fortune flew silent, his Tie fighter leaving a very faint trail as it dashes off on their assigned patrol route. "Keep your eyes sharp, I don't know if the Rebels will strike but I've got a bad feeling about this.", the man's voice could only be heard by their flight, the four Ties the only thing that covered this remote sensor outpost in Gyndine's system. The system's forces were beefed up, but most of the reinforcements were assigned to the shipyards and closer to more strategic location. This sensor rated no more than a flight, explaining Fortune's unease. Jonas flicks his comm to his flight's private channel. "Relax, will ya?" he grunts. "Or else your paranoia's going to rub off on me and make -me- paranoid." He glances out his TIE's viewport to the other two ships in his formation, frowning slightly. "Still, you kinda have a point. I don't think it was a good idea for us to be spread this thin." "Being paranoid never hurt n...", Fortune cuts off his words as his cockpit begins blaring, his radar warning him that something appeared within range. Or rather, five somethings, the starfighters, they transited out of hyperspace close enough to be identified straight away, orienting themselves a moment before streaming ahead towards the sensor drone. Ghost 8 set his S-foils on attack position as soon as he was in the system, his weapons coming to life soon after. The Ghost Squadron flight sped ahead of the fifth, a B-wing, the mission was clear, to occupy the outpost's covering ships long enough for it to be destroyed. Jonas growls under his breath. "They're back already? These guys just don't when to quit. They're either really bold or really stupid." He engages his ship's thrusters and boosts ahead of his group to engage the rebel squadron. "Well, what are we waiting for?" he urges enthusiastically. "Let's clear 'em out and show 'em who's boss!" Ghost 8's target was chosen at random, although it did not take long for his astromech to reveal that this target was one very familiar to him. The Zabrak flies ahead of his companions, wanting to be the first to reach Jonas. A few potshots are directed at the Tie, not so much to harm him, there was no chance of that at this distance, but get his attention. "I'm happy that we'll finish what we started before.", he transmits to the opposite pilot. If Jonas' opponent could see him, he'd see that he was grinning like a madman as he directed his ship towards him. "Well, well, well," he shoots back after flipping to an open channel. "Nice to see you too, buddy. At least now I can vape you properly! Let's dance." As he swiftly closes the distance between the two fighters, he fires off a volley of bright green lasers. The X-wing was shook by the shots that ricochet against the vessel's shields, nearly punching through them entirely. The Zabrak within gritted his teeth, the wider battle between the starfighters ignored as he focused first on his mission and second on his personal engagement. There were no more words exchanged with the Tie pilot, the first ones having served their purpose. He swerves wide left and begins climbing only to dive back down at the oncoming Tie, now slightly below and to the right of him, a shot fired at his opponent. Jonas pulls hard on the controls, vainly attempting to roll his TIE out of the line of fire, but it's too little too late. He curses under his breath as his cockpit is rocked by a violent shuddering, but the shields manage to hold. "Lucky shot," he says, as if trying to convince himself. He maneuvers his fighter into a sharp corkscrew dive, somersaulting underneath the X-wing before coming up again from behind. He squeezes the trigger again, unleashing another hail of bolts from his TIE's laser cannons. Rather than try to go on the offensive, the X-wing starts maneuvering sharply, banking right, diving, rising steeply, all in an effort to shake the Tie on his tail. The Zabrak took the time to see to his shields, his astromech working as rapidly as it could to get them back online. "Try now...I know, I know, just try!" Jonas attempts to stay on the rebel's tail, mimicking the other pilot's moves as close as he can. He shoots off a few quick bursts from his cannons each time the fighter's frame passes through his targeting reticule, hoping that at least one might strike another crucial blow. hile hit, the damage taken was mitigated by Ghost 8's maneuvering, the vessel suffering only minor damage along one of its wings. Still, the attempt to raise the shields back up again failed and he decided to switch back to the offensive. The X-wing begins performing a series of wide rolls, drawing the Tie in only to turn sharply during one of those turns and reorient himself. He headed straight for the Tie, his weapons blazing to life as he fired a salvo at his opponent. Just then, the radar on the Tie would reveal that the B-wing that had appeared had managed to sneak closer towards the sensor outpost, beginning a run against it. Jonas performs a series of dizzying rolls that only a TIE could possibly attempt, each of the X-wing's lasers sailing harmlessly past his fighter's solar arrays. He glances at his sensors and growls. "Anyone out there not tied up too much to take care of that B-wing?" he hisses to his teammates. He banks sharply to the right, looping around in a wide arc to lose his opponent with his Avenger's greater speed before positioning himself behind and shooting again. The Republican strategy was to draw the fighters away from the drone and leave a corridor open for the B-wing. This was precisely what was happening, and the Zabrak flew close to the TIE to cut off his avenues of retreat back towards their target. The Tie's latest shots fly extremely close to the Zabrak's starfighter, a breath of relief let out as they miss by only some meters, if that. Again he switches to the attack, changing his axis of direction and aiming himself back at the Tie, his trigger depressed once more. Jonas growls again as he dodges the X-wing's lasers, the blood red beams lighting up his viewport as they streak past him. "Damn it! Anybody out there NOT busy with something, get your butt over here and take out that B-wing!" Rather than resolve his grievances with the enemy pilot, he disengages from the fighter and makes tracks for the bigger threat, pushing his thrusters to their absolute limits. "Frack it, I'll do it myself! Cover me!" As he gets closer he activates his secondary weapons, firing a concussion missile at the B-wing despite how far away from it he still is; he had to stop it before it blew up the outpost. As the concussion missile nears Dagger 3, its pilot spins then shoots rapidly downward in an effort to evade the missile, which fizzles past the uniquely-shaped craft. After re-establishing his vector on the sensor drone, its pilot grins at the range indicators and locks onto his target. "Target's hot...birds away!" The pilot calls out over the republic frequency as he pulls the trigger for the B-wings torpedoes. A curse is let out as the Tie begins pulling away, the enemy fighter's better engines proving themselves as the distance between the Zabrak and it increases. Rather than count simply on speed to prevent the B-wing from being interrupted, the X-wing's torpedo launchers come to life, a torpedo fired straight ahead at the Tie. "Pour everything on that thing, I'm not sure how long I can keep him off you.", he transmits to the B-wing's pilot. The dashboard in Jonas' cockpit assaults him with loud warning beeps of an incoming missile. For a few seconds he ignores it, his sole focus on the B-wing in front of him that he's desperately attempting to close in on. He fires off a few linked bursts of his lasers, more meant to distract the B-wing pilot and make him stray off course. Amidst the emerald blasts he manages to fire off another concussion missile, and then yanks hard on his controls. He swerves his TIE Avenger out of the way of the proton torpedo right at the last moment, the force of his maneuver sending him into a dizzying tumble. "Roger that, Ghost 8..." the answer comes over the radio only moments before the concussion missile explodes against Dagger 3's shields with a bright flash. Growling as the cockpit shudders to absorb the impact, its pilot banks hard to the side, now in a direction more or less facing Jonas' craft, then pulls steeply upward, aiming to bait the pilot into a better shot for Ghost 8; if he was going to be shot at, at least he'd to try to give the X-wing a better profile of the damn bowtie to shoot at. The X-wing closed in on his opponent, and when his torpedo was evaded, the Zabrak switched to his main guns. Laserfire follow the Tie's wild tumble, taxing the X-wing's generators, and the Zabrak lets up on his fire only long enough to let it recharge. AS soon as the Tie begins to level off, he fires again, attempting to force it away from the B-wing and leave the bomber space to fire. Jonas grimaces as his TIE takes a solid hit, rocking his fighter as he attempts to level out again. Rather than giving chase to the B-wing, he hangs back a little to give himself some space to maneuver; there was no way he was going to let them destroy this outpost, and there was no way he'd go and make himself an easy target either. He weaves to and fro, trying to make himself more difficult to shoot while at the same time concentrating on getting in a good shot at the B-wing with his concussion missiles. "C'mon, c'mon..." he mumbles under his breath, waiting for the right moment. And then his targeting computer beeps, and he squeezes the trigger, shortly followed by the familiar whooshing sound of the concussion missile leaving his weapon port. This time, the concussion missile is evaded, even if just barely. The important thing is that rather than hitting the B-wing, the missile passes harmlessly through the space between its wings. Not wanting to waste the moment of opportunity, the pilot levels himself to the drone once again to open fire on it. A slight yell is let out by the Zabrak at the latest strike on the sensor drone. "I don't know your name, buddy," he calls out over comms, the Rapier's various squadrons not finding much room to interact on a personal level, "But you keep that up and I'll buy you a drink when we get back." If they get back, and that was a very big if. The pilot directed himself once more at the Tie, this time intent on charging straight at him and force him to forget about going after the B-wing, another salvo sent forth from his canons. There is a sense of frantic desperation in Jonas' piloting. Instead of weaving and dodging wildly, he flies unusually straight, jinking or juking his TIE out of the path of a laser or proton torpedo only at the last second. For the most part, he ignores the fighter on his tail, instead focusing his offense on the B-wing. The Imperial pilot is relentlessly aggressive, nearly overheating his lasers as he pelts the fighter with them, and firing off yet another missile; that Rebel ship had to go -down- and go down fast. In between rolling his craft and juking from side to side to evade the TIE, he doesn't have much time to straighten himself toward his target. Thankfully, though, its a stationary target, and Dagger 3 is only getting closer. "Alright, lets pop this thing and end this party," he says to himself, pumping a few bursts of laser fire and another torpedo toward the sensor drone. The drone's destruction is not spontaneous, the fire that had started internally in several sections punching through its bulkheads. Until now, it had been somewhat contained by the lack of oxygen on the unmanned sensor, but the last torpedo to strike it detonated against a power relay for the entire drone. The explosion that ensued made its way through the longest axis of the cross-shaped drone, consuming section by section and sending debris and shrapnel flying. Finally, when it reached the power generation section, a relatively massive explosion, for something of its size, sent a shockwave forth from the charred-ruins of the drone. The lack of sound did not make this spectacle any less impressive to witness. "Alright, mission accomplished, get out now, rendezvous is Point A23 in your maps.", the flight leader's voice heard by all four other fighters. "Whooooeeeeeeey!" Dagger 3's gleeful voice breaks the static as his craft flies around and among the debris generated by the explosion. "'Bout time, lets blow this joint and head home." Jonas growls into his comlink. "You're not getting away that easy!" He attempts to give chase to the retreating rebel flight, perhaps a bit too hastily. He fails to notice the sensor array exploding and is unable to react in time. While the blast doesn't engulf his ship completely, the force of it sends debris crashing into his TIE, knocking out its remaining shields and a good number of its systems, leaving it virtually crippled as it careens around in space along with the remnants of the sensor outpost. Inside his cockpit, Jonas is cursing loudly and banging his fist against the control panel in order to get it back in working order, knowing full well that the battle's already been lost.
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