6. OK, you've made your point...

[dakota]

Vex took a hard breath. The tragedy of Alderaan was bad enough, but the Imps setting up a base here disgusted him. He had to focus to stay calm as he continued to fly the ship in a sweeping arc around the Imperials to bypass them. "Where exactly am I taking us?" Some of his emotion carried in his voice.

[Mierin]

Hearing the emotion in Vex's voice, Jessa's tone of voice is her usual cold self as she says, "We've got a small wing of fighters headed in our direction. Let's stay sharp."

[Renekin Skywalker]

Alio leaned forward in contenplation, his chin resting on his fingertips.

"Take us in," he said, calmly. "Full speed. A single strafing run before the fighters get to us."

Alio then sat back.

"Attack positions, ship-to-ship cannons only. No shields until the last minute."

"Captain?" M-3TO.

Alio shifted to look at the droid.

"You think this wise?" The droid asked.

Alio did not smile. "We will await the wisdom until this done."

[dakota]

"Captain, it's your ship, but I think we're making a huge mistake if we throw away our advantage here. If we barge right in they can get word out this ship and it's cloaking device exists." Vex argued. " We'll never do enough damage fast enough that they can't get word off and then the entire Imp fleet will be hunting us." He then smirked slightly. "Of course, if we try something a little more devious, they don't get that chance. What if we drift right up nose to nose and hammer them point blank? No targeting locks, just line of sight firing starting with comm relays and command bridge first. Sith, you fly and let Jessa and me help with the guns, we need more than two shooters if we go manual and pull this off with one barrage. To the fighters it will look more like an explosion than laser fire and we hightail it out of here before they come looking for whoever hit them."

[Mierin]

Jessa waits for the captain to make a decision, ready to head to the guns if necessary.

[Renekin Skywalker]

"It's a good bet the Empire already knows we're here," Alio said. "But you raise a good point."

He turned to Jessa. "Target their communications arrays as much as possible."

"Attack speed."

The pair could sense the barely-cantained hatred coming from Alio.

[dakota]

"You're kidding, right? Captain, if they knew we're here, those fighters would be all over us like mynocks on a leaky power cable." Vex tried to reason with Alio. He did however engage the ship's engines so they were indeed closing on the base. " I know an Imp base here is an abomination, but even if we do manage to destroy it, they'll build another one and this one will be stronger and have more support." He looked at Jessa for a little help. "Unless you plan to take and hold this area, hammering that base does little to help us defeat the Imps once and for all." Still, he continued to close.

[Mierin]

Jessa doesn't bother arguing with the captain and simply targets their communication array.

[Renekin Skywalker]

"Attack speed," Alio intoned. "Communications array, only."

It was clear by the lack of traffic around the Imperial base that they were not prepared to witness the fire power against their fully armed and operational battle station (sorry).

Whisper approached quite close before the base showed any signs of reacting.

[dakota]

"You're the boss." Vex replied as he engaged the engines, vectoring to cut across just above the garrison. " Jessa, I'll give you as clean a shot as I can, then punch us out of harm's way soon as you vape that comm array." Once he had the ship up to flank speed, he relaxed and activated the maneuvering jets so it threw them askew, pointing the nose of the Galaxy at the base in what otherwise looked like the cruiser was in a skid. " Money shot, light them up."

[Mierin]

Jessa nods at Vex and she waits for her chance. When she has a clear shot, Jessa doesn't hesitate to fire.

[Renekin Skywalker]

Thanks to Vex's navigation, the bridge had a spectacular view of the event.

After just a pair of shots, the shields had ruptured and the communications array ruptured into space-flame. The short-lived flame gave way to escaping debris.

It was quickly evident that the ship's cannons were meant to deal serious damage, quickly.

Soon, Vex's manouveur lost its original arc of spin, and was turning away from the station. Much as a spirograph, the first arc had the ship turning with the station as the axis, then the axis switch to more to the rear of the ship.

"Oh my heavens," M-3TO said.

"Hyperspace escape course plotted," Ven Demme said. The statement had startled the protocol droid.

Alio didn't respond for a second.

"Captain?" M-3TO asked. "What are your orders."

"Go." Alio conceded. "Go now."

[dakota]

"Copy that Captain." Vex said with a relaxed tone as he straightened out their heading on Ven Demme's course. As soon as his display indicated they were clear to jump, he toggled the controls and watched the starfield distort before they entered hyperspace. He leaned back in his seat and let out a sigh of relief, "Wow. I've flown fighters that maneuver worse than this tub. Nice shooting, partner." He grinned as he glanced over to Jessa. "So Cap, where are we headed?"

[Renekin Skywalker]

"That is interesting," M-3TO said. "To have so much success so quickly."

The droid turned to Alio. "Now, on the matter of the coolant system, we are running at 98% optimal levels..."

Alio immediately started massaging the bridge of his nose.

[dakota]

Vex had to hold in a grin as the droid began to pester. "Cap, unless you need us, I'd like to go explore some more of the ship while we're in transit." He threw a sideways glance at Jessa. "Someone could comm jst before we drop out of hyperspace, I should be back here within ten minutes. Ven demme can monitor things while he plots our next heading."