The Rebel Faction

As newly appointed Captain Vaseli Zokolev sat in his private quarters, he could feel the slight vibrations pulsing through the deck of the Strike-Class cruiser as it traveled through hyperspace. While he studed the data pad in front of him, Vaseli was eager to prove himself on this first mission of his. Even though this was supposed to be a routine diplomatic escort mission, Vaseli had his crew's practicing throughout the whole hyperspace flight. The four ship placed under his command were running drilling of one form or another almost every three hours.

Even though they were not expected to encounter any resistance, Vaseli had alwas felt it was better to be safe than sorry. There were always many things that could go wrong on a starship, other then combat situations and he wanted his crew as ready as they could be. He also knew that as the new captain of this ship and the others in his group he would have to earn the respect of his crew.

Looking over the manifest of his ships he found out that his command ship, the Strike class cruiser Warrior, was the oldest ship among his group. Never the less it was a formidable opponent to face in combat. Vaseli had studied the ship long and hard to develop stratagies of using the ship's strengths, while at the same time minimizing its weakness. He has done the same with all the other ships under his command.

At the academy he had learned much about space combat and operations. They had trained him in many classic maneuvers that he had then employed almost effortlessly in the simulators. Sometimes his instructors would scold him for deviating from the assigned maneuvers, but he never let it get to him. Throughout the engagments he would hear his late father's words, telling him that one must never be rigid during battles or any other part of their lives. A good captain always understood the great balance between strictness and flexibility. One must always adapt to any challenge or risk defeat.

Setting the data pad down upon the desk in front of him, Vaseli pushed his chair back and stood up slowly with his hands on the edges. Once up he straightened his uniform and turned towards the viewport located on the one of the walls of his quarters. Crossing his hands accross his chest as he walked towards the transperisteel window, Captain Zokolev stood in front of it. He admired the chaotic beauty just outside his ship. His red piercing eyes watching the waves of blue and white wash over his vessel.

He thought about the mission at hand and how he hoped that everything would go according to plan. Inside, however, something was telling him that it might be the case this time around. It could just be first mission jitters, but through years of experiance he knew that instincts could be the difference between life and death. Vaseli promised himself he would try and be extra causious during the mission.

"Captain Zokolev, would you please come see my in my quarters?" The voice of Holin Tronona sounded through his comm, interupting his thoughts. Holin was the diplomat/negotiator that Vaseli's group was assigned to escort on this mission. Outside of combat situations, Holin also had the complete authority of excercising command over the entire escort group. This ment that Mr. Tronona had rank on Vaseli.

"Yes sir, I'll be right there." Vaseli replied and quickly turned on his heels towards the exit. He strode out of the room and walks towards the turbolift closest to his quarters. Along the way a siren sounded out of nowhere. Vaseli looked at his chrono just as crew members rushed out of their rooms and towards designated areas. It was time for another scheduled drill.

"Fire in the galley! Repeat, fire in the galley! All crews to stations!"Called out the voice over the ships communication network. "This is a drill! This is a drill!"

Vaseli let out a small grin as he stepped inside the turbolift and inserted his rank cylinder into the proper slot on the control panel. This would ensure that the turbolift would not stop anywhere but the designated deck. As soon as the door locked shut the turbolift accelerated away from the terminal.

Once the doors opened, Vaseli pulled the rank cylinder out and replaced it into his pocket. He walked out and turned left towards the special guest quarters, noticing that the hallways were almost devoid of any life. The only crew member around was an officer who was making sure everyone was in their designated areas. In moments the Captain reached the door of the guest quarters and knocked on it.

"Sir, this is Captain Zokolev. You requested my presence?"

Captain Zokolev was now seated where he belonged, on the bridge of his cruiser. He sat back in his command chair and stared out into the waves and spirals of blue and white stretching beyond his ship. The long hyperspace jump would soon be over and he would once again be in an environment which he was most familiar with. This environment was open space.

He looked down at this chrono and saw that there were still five minutes left in this jump. By his calculations the support vessels making up his group would soon be emerging somewhere behind him. They would come out early and lay in wait if the situation should arise in which they would be needed. Vaseli hoped this wouldn't be the time to use them. His father had always told a true warrior never wished for war, however, if war found them they should everything possible to win.

It was like that at the moment. He did not wish for a fight, but that was something that may not be up to him to decide. He knew the history of the world he was headed to very well. It had suffered long ago at the hands of the Emiper, during the time of the Rebellion. Vaseli was sure that they never forgot what had happened and would probably not be all too happy to recieve them as guests.

He looked down slowly from his chair and surveyed the men and women before him. They were all working diligently at their stations and that was all Vaseli could ask for. They had drilled long and hard to achieve teamwork and it could be abserved now. As his eyes swept across the bridge he caught sight of his executive officer leaning over the shoulder of a junior officer. The man was probably explaining something or corrected some error on the part of the crew member.

Vaseli had much faith in the performance of Executive Officer Junimar. The man had proven himself time and time again to be steady in the face of danger and stress. All that had been in simulations, however, and Vaseli had always wondered what would happened in combat. His gut feeling told him that he had nothing to fear. Junimar would make a fine captain someday.

An alarm sounded three times and broke Vaseli's thoughts. He knew what it ment, but turned towards his XO almost immediatly. The second in command turned back towarded Vaseli quickly. "Real space reentry in sixty seconds Captain."

Vaseli nodded in acknowledgement slowly, "Very good XO. I want shields up as soon as we exit, but keep all weapons powered down. I don't want to spook anyone on that planet if we don't have to."

"Yes, sir. Understood." The XO turned to relay the command to the rest of the crew and stepped towards another computer terminal.

Captain Zokolev reached over beside himself and lifted up a glass of cold water. He took a sip while his eyes again wondered towards the viewport before him. Once more he thought about what lay before him.

His comm beeped just as the bridge timer counted down to thirty seconds. Vaseli hit the button and answered, "This is Captain Zokolev."

"Captain, I'd like you to meet me in the hanger once you establish orbit. I hope you have not forgotten about our agreement." Came the voice from the other end. A voice that Vaseli instanstly recognized.

"Of course I have not Negotiator Tronona. I shall meet you there as soon as I am able."

The conversation ended right after his confirmation and he glanced again at the timer before him. They were just about to reenter and he knew what was soon to come from years of experiance.

"Reversion to real space in Five... Four... Three... Two... One...." The officer in front called out.

As the timer and the man both said One the bluish white tunnel they had all been traveling in collapsed around them. They were once again surrounded by blackness and the twinkle of stars, something they had not seen for over a day. Vaseli felt the shudder and heard whine as the rear ion drives light up and fire. They desk gently vibrated as the engines pushed the ship through space.

"All systems green Captain. Shields up and at 100 percent. Weapons are powered down as per your orders." Stated the XO.

"Good, very good Commander Junimar. All ahead two thirds and report on my other ships." Vaseli instructed as he looked out and watched the blue green planet slowly grow in front of his ship.

"Firehawk, Dragon, and Condor all report as on station and awaiting further orders sir."

Vaseli nodded and look back towards his XO. "How's the space looking around us. Any presense of enemy forces?"

"Negative sir, space looks clear from here onto Toprawa. No sign of enemy activity."

Captain Zokolev ran his hand over his chin and looked at the holo display of the planet. There was a moon orbiting the planet and to him that would be a good place to keep some ships hidden. "Commander I want you to concentrate on that moon during the whole time we're in system. That would be perfect place from which to stage a surprise attack. Inform me of anything strange."

"Yes, sir, understood." Came the reply.

Vaseli then turned towards the communications terminal and ordered the woman stationed there to inform the Toprawa authorities that Negotiator Tronona had arrived. As she did her duty the Captain turned back towards his XO and slowly stood up.

"Commander put us into orbit around their capital city." He smiled slowly and put his hands around his back as he wanted the planet get closer. He could still make out some blackened areas from a planetary bombardment of long ago. Vaseli watched his second in command work as the man instructed the crew in stationing the large ship in geosynchronous obirt with the planet. Soon they were floated directly above the planet's largest city.

Vaseli smiled as he looked down towards the city below them and than back towards Junimar. "That should give them some second thoughts if they any plans of attacking us."

Commander Junimar nodded in agreement and gave his Commanding Officer a small grin back.

"The bridge if yours Commander Junimar. It has come time for me to accompany Mr.Tronona to the surface. Keep my updated on all developments." Vaseli stated and turned to leave.

As he came closer to the bridge's exit, Captain Zokolev reached down and slowly felt the box inside his pocket. He wondered again what it could be. Suddenly a feeling came over him and he turned his head back towards the bridge as an afterthought.

"Commander...plot the positions of all military instillations and supporting infrastructure around the city. Try to locate any ground weapons emplacements as well." With that said he turned back towards the exit and quickly strode out of the bridge.

Captain Zokolev's assumption about the General had been dead on. For most of their trip the General had been telling him tales of his past battles. Some of which had occured before Vaseli had even been born. Over the past forty minutes Vaseli learned to respect the man seated in front of him.

What the Captain appreciated about experianced military men was that most didn't care grudges of past generations. Even though Vaseli was an Imperial, the General didn't seem to link him to the actions of other Imperials long ago. This planet had been all but razed and then humiliated by Imperial forces and the General still did not hate Vaseli. He knew that the Captain with whom he was with at the moment did not take part in that operation and therefore the General had nothing to hate him for.

All to often this was not true with politicians. They had a hard time looking past the actions of state even after the the ones in charge had changed. This was the case at the assembly Holin Tronona attended now. As he now sat before the panel of six representatives and the Chancellor of the planet, Holin could tell this would be one of those difficult missions.

What he knew for certain was that half the representatives were for joining The New Order, while the other half was not going to let the past go. Chancellor Poprima was in the middle, he wanted to keep the discussions from getting to heated and weighting the options before him.

"What does the Empire offer us Negotiator Tronona?" One of the representatives asking.

Holin looked to where the question came from and sat up. "The New Order is willing to offer Toprawa full trading rights. It would increase your gross planetary income substantially. Also, once a member of The New Order, this planet would get all the protection that comes with that membership."

Before Holin could continue one of the men stood up and shouted, "The same kind of protection that almost wiped out our whole civilization?! The Empire almost destroyed this whole planet and forced the rest into starvation! I wont let this happen again!"

Negotiator Holin wasn't really taken aback, he had expected something like this to happen. "Representative Morni, I'm sorry about what happened to this planet before, but that is in the past. The Empire is no more and as long as this planet stays a loyal member of the New Order nothing like would happen ever again."

"Is that right? What if we change our minds later? Will your military force us to stay loyal?"

Holin sat back into his seat a little and look up at the man. "I do not speak for the Empire as a whole or know what the Emperor is thinking. I can not tell you what would happen if you betray our trust in you. Is not a relationship about give and take? For all that we offer you, the least you should able to give is respect and loyalty."

"You all hear this man?! He is all but threatening us already."

"Calm down, Calm down. No one is threating anyone." Chencellor Poprima called out calmly, trying to have the man sit down.

"We all know what happened last time. The planet has been well off on its own and I believe we should independent and make our own decisions."

There was a resounding applause from half the table upon these said words. It was becoming clear these three men were fully against the New Order proposal. He had to somehow sway the Chancellor into voting his way. That would break the tie and become the decisive factor.

Before Holin could speak another word Chancellor Poprima's aid rushed into the room. He moves towards the Chancellor with urgency and bent down to whisper into the man's ear. Poprima's faced seemed to change almost instantly and he slowly nodded in some form of acknowledge to what had been said. Holin knew it was something important and probably something related to this meeting.

"My aid here has just informed me that the media on the planet has gotten information on your arrival. I know you wanted these talks to be held in private at first, but it seems someone leaked the information out. It is all over the news." The Chancellor declared as his aid stood beside him.

"It would seem that your visit has sparked a few protests. There is one right outside this building. You may come and take a look Mr.Negotiator." Continued Chancellor Poprima as he gestured towards the window.

Vaseli was back where he loved to be, sitted on the bridge of his cruiser. In front he could see the planet and the green landscape. No longer was the city visible to him, but he knew it was there, below his ship. Somewhere in that city was the man he met, General Lucia, probably getting briefed by the Chancellor.

Holin had let him know that the Negotiations had not gone well. He had told Vaseli to prepare for the worst and the Captain now realised that what he had felt before was turing out to be correct. Soon he might have to fight and even kill the General he had toured with and the men he had seen at the military installations.

With his ship now on full alert he had all his men at their battlestations and ready for war. The compliment of special operations troops his ship carried were getting ready and the fighter pilots were now always close to their fighters in case they were needed. Vaseli now only had to give the command and they would be engaging targets.

Vaseli looked over at the holo display at the front, noting all the points marked on it. Each point represented a part of the planets defense in their sector. While he had been on the surface, his XO had followed orders and had located numerous defense systems and military bases. All were now locked into the ship's fire computers.

"Captain Zokolev, would you please load this data into your ship's computer system?" Came a voice from beside him.

Vaseli turned his head away from the display and looked at Holin, who stood next to him with an out stretched hand. Reaching over to take the object in the man's hands, Vaseli could see it was a data drive. He handed it over to the man and watched as the data was quickly accessed. Soon new locations started to appear on the holo projector and the Captain quickly realised they were all points along the route they had taken on his tour.

"Those troopers were spying weren't they Negotiator Tronona?" Vaseli questioned.

The elderly man shrugged with an expressionless face. "We all have our orders Captain and we all have the duty to carry them out."

As these words left Holin's mouth he turned towards the XO. "Commander Junimar, may I have the comm please. Patch me through to Chancellor Poprima's office."

The Commander nodded and did was he was ordered. In moments he had the Chancellor on the comm and turned back toward the Negotiator to let the man know. No one on the bridge knew what would happen next.

"Chancellor, this is Negotiator Tronona. I would once more like to persuade you to take the New Order's offer and join us as an equal."

"Mr.Negotiator, thank you for comming here and inviting us to join, however the people are not ready to take that step. Perhaps in the future we could meet again and discuss this issue further." Came the reply from Chancellor Poprima.

"Chancellor, I'm sorry to hear that. I guess we have nothing more to discuss." Holin turned off the comm and turned towards Vaseli.

"Captain, your orders are to take this planet at all costs. Demolish all defenses and proper for ground invasion." He turned to leave before calling out, "I want you to get the Chancellor first. Activate the emergancy beacon detectors. signal one is from the Chancellor and signal two is General Lucia. Make them pay for defying the Empire Captain."

Vaseli was about to ask how it was the two got tagged when he remembered the gifts they had brought with them. Each one of those man had recieved a gift and now each of those gifts were giving their position away. As soon as the Commander turned on the detectors they started getting the sound of a constant ping. Within moments two dots on the holo display started blinking.

"They both seem to be in the governmental building sir." Vaseli nodded slowly. He didn't like it, but he had orders. The Captain knew all to well how many people were going to die today, but he would complete his duty. It was the will of the New Order.

"Designate that target Alpha Commander Junimar. Pass down the targeting coordinates to Batteries two and six. Move use to," the Captain looked over the display. "One...four... nine and ready for planetary bombardment. I want all heavy weapons emplacements hit first, then move onto air strips and air defenses. The army bases will be the last of the targets."

Vaseli watchs his people instantly go to work. Within moments the Warrior started to slowly shift in space, moving to port and away from the capital. Their course would take them between the city and the main Military installation within the sector, allowing the ship to engage both it and the city if need be.

"Sound full battle stations Commander Juminar. Launch all fighters and prepare ground teams. I want special operations teams on the ground and giving us targets. Lets also have them secure a landing area." Vaseli commanded as he looked out of the viewport and sat back in his seat.

Captain Zokolev designated ground targets and listed off orders to each of the ships turbolaser emplacements. After giving them all targets he turned to the Commander. "Lock in target Alpha as well as the others. We are weapons free. I repeat, we are weapons free. All turbolasers prepare to fire on my mark. Remember people, we are now at war with this planet, stay sharp."

Vaseli started the count down as he looked out the front once more. "Three.. two.. one...Mark! Fire! Fire!"

Within moments 5 turbolaser batteries and 8 turbolaser cannons fired out, causing the hull to vibrate. The energy bolts lanced out towards the planets surface for the first time in decades. Again it would have to endure a planetary bombardment.

The Chancellor and the General were in conferance when one of the turbolaser blasts passed by the tall building and slamed into another one beside it. That build almost completely vaporized, while the rest of it became a molten mess of duracrete and reinforcement bars. The two hundred workers inside the build at the time died almost instantly.

No one had a change because seconds later that single turbolaser bolt was joined by 2 more. Both of these found their mark and smashed into the Government skyscrapper from the side. One sheered the upper ten floors almost completely off, melting or vaporizing everything that it had initially hit. Those upper floors instantly sagged and slide off the building, falling from the sky towards the builds and citizens below.

It was the second of these two bolts that killed both the Chancellor and General Lucia. The massive blast impacted the center of the large building, passing through it like a plasma cutter passes through aluminium. Inside this sections of the building were the two men. The bombardment only ceased when the whole building had been reduced to a molten, burned pile of rubble. An offical count would later reveal that over five thousand people had died as result of this lone strike.

As the three Toprawan defense ships quickly approached, the Warrior was still softening up the ground defenses. The assault was never let up and every seconds turbolasers lanced out towards the surface of the planet, turning more and more of it into chared ruins. During this time Captain Zokolev looked over the tactical display in front of him, looking cool and composed.

Vaseli knew that panicing and doing something irrational was the worse things a captain could do. Actions like that were ones that got people killed and he had no intention of having anyone of his crew die today. As the planet turned under his ship Vaseli watched the starboard side of his ship become more fully directed at the oncomming defense ships. When they reached his ship's weapons range, they would get a nasty surprise.

As the word reached that bridge that the last of the enemy fighters had been destroyed, the three defense ships finally entered the Strike cruiser's engagement zone. Vaseli gave the orders and the cruiser's whole starboard side errupted with turbolaser fire. These dead bolts crossed the distance reather quickly and were all targeted towards one of the gunships. Some missed, as the ship was coming head on and proving a smaller profile, but many didn't. The shields buckled yet for now held

"Keep our fighters away from those gunships, I don't want them getting knicked with those quads they have." Vaseli commanded as he looked at the chrono which was now counting down the times until the other ships arrived.

"Missiles incoming sir!"

The initial barrage must have caught the commander of those ships off guard and caused him to make an error. Vaseli let out a small smile as he watched the missile close with his ship from long range. That commander was General Lucia, Vaseli pondered. They had launched from too far away and were giving him plenty of time to react.

As he was commanding his crew to prepare to engage the missles and directed some of his fighters to conduct interception duties, his shields blossomed with the implacts of the enemy turbolasers. The powerful strike cruise's shields help strong, however, although started to draw more power to compansate.

In kind, the Warrior's batteries responded over and over, hammering the very same gunship that was approaching them. That ship's shields held for a moment more, until ion bolts started to hit the hull. These bolts shorted and overloaded the already taxed shield generator, allowing the next full barrage to slam right into the gunship's bridge and forward sections. The armor could not absorb these heavy shots and melted under the assault. A lot of the armor plates fractured and opened up, causing fires within the ship.

Worse damage came from a direct hit on the gunship's bridge. The bridge and all the crew were instantly vaporized as the bow of the ship starts to crumple from the bombardment. Even with the command crew gone, the ship kept moving forward. It was preceeding towards its previous course and would probably not stop until the engine crews shut down the engine manually.

Meanwhile, the missiles had been intercepted by the TIE defenders and five of the four had managed to make it through the screen. These were quickly targeted and engaged with the strike cruiser's onboard laser systems. Being much larger than fight grade torpedoes these missiles provided a larger target and all but one were destroyed out in space. The last one impacted the shields close to the bridge, detonating in a brilliant fireball that caused the viewports to dim.

As the shaking subsided, Vaseli strolled towards the front of the bridge, hands across his chest the man looked out over the length of his cruiser. To the right, he could see the enemy ships getting bigger, flashes constaintly appearing from their hulls and then impacting the shields that protected the Warrior. His own guns fired back, finding their mark on the second gunship, causing its shields to glow with each impact.

"Helm, bring us around! I want full power and bring us to Zero Three Nine." Vaseli called out as he looked at his chrono, the timing had to be perfect.

He felt the ship's engines roar to life and cause the whole deck to vibrate as the pushed the large ship away from the planets gravity and directed towards the still intact gunship and corvette. As he presented them his bow, a lot of the turbolaser fire started to streak by and impact the side shields or miss completely. Soon, though, the enemy gunners readjusted and started firing at the strike cruiser with all forward cannons.

As he watched four more missiled fired towards his ship. These came from a much closer range and therefore didn't give the gunner much time to respond. Three of the large missiles slamed right into the Warrior's forward shields. The shields held for two of them, but then went down and let the third slip past, allowing it to hit a section directly above the ship's nose. The resulting explosion pierced the hull and damged 2 decks underneath.

Thankfully that section had been free of peronnel and only three men were injurned when they were smashed against the internal bulkheads after the impact. There was also no fire to be seen and that was something else Vaseli could be thankfull about.

As his ship accelerated away from the planet, it split the two remaining defense ships in half as it moved out of the area. While it passed by, the gunners were able to deliver heavy broadsides to both ships. The lighter shields of the corvette gave away for a moment and explosion stitched along its whole length as turbolasers pounded the smaller ship. In seconds it was all over, however. The Strike cruiser had flown by the two ships and they had moved into the planets gravity to start taking up new defensive positions.

Vaseli finally order his ship to slow and turn port to fire another boardside, when his chrono chimed and let him know that time had elapsed. Choreographed almost the to tee, three other ships under his command came out of hyperspace off to port. All the ships put up their shields and then quickly spread out in space to cover all exit vectors from Toprawa. This time it was the Imperials turn to have sprung the trap.