Jedi Insurgency 181

AN: Quick reminder, Gora was introduced in ch 168 if you want to refresh your memory regarding current events.

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Whilst Corvus was dropping Omega & Triss off at the warehouse, the men of the Bad Batch had decided that the time to strike was now. 

Following the plan that they had drilled several dozen times, the following actions were conducted with ease. 

The assault upon Gora's palace was swift, and surgical. 

All at once, every camera feed across Gora’s palace went dark, and the power shut off, plunging the super structure into absolute darkness. 

Echo-who had infiltrated earlier as a service engineer-jacked into the final access port and felt the system collapse under his control like a nervous system severed at the spine. Red warning glyphs bloomed across his display as backup subroutines tried, and failed to assert themselves.

“Security blackout complete.” Echo muttered into the comms, already moving onto his next objective. 

Leaving behind several unconscious security personnel within the maintenance room, he came face to face with a squad of mercenaries. They knew what had caused the blackout, and were professionals, not the standard bumbling goon. Without waiting for Echo to explain himself or talk his way out of things with his engineer persona, they opened fire. 

Red blaster fire streaked across the corridor, forcing Echo to dodge. Rolling forward, all the bolts aimed at his chest sailed overhead. Midroll, he caught two men between the eyes, forcing them to instantly collapse, dead. As he came up, his mechanical arm resonated with a short sonic pulse. The cone of sound rushed forward, incapacitating four more guards. Seconds later, his other arm unloaded four quick, precise shots. Each shot took one man down, there were no unnecessary motions. 

He then advanced through the confusion, ripping the disguise off, he slammed his helmet on from the ‘tool bag’ he had been carrying to complete the illusion. The darkness hid him well as crowds of guests, prostitutes, servants, musicians, chefs, and all sorts of noncombatants screamed or ran like headless Nuna's. 

Then the hangar exploded, eliminating the best means of escape. 

Wrecker’s charges went off at the perfect time. Echo had found yet another squad of mercenaries guarding a chokepoint. When the super structure shuddered from the impact, some of them glanced in the direction of the explosion, others stumbled forward. 

None of them noticed the thermal detonator that had rolled beneath their feet. 

The resulting explosion caught them off guard, instantly vaporizing six of the ten man squad. Blue personal shields flickered on the other four men. Echo closed the distance just as they raised their blasters. Emerging from the smoke like a phantom, the clone super commando shoved a mechandrite into one man, and released a pulse. The energy shield was overloaded, and electrocuted him to death. Shoving the corpse forward like a primitive shield, he absorbed several blaster bolts before colliding with the next merc. Slamming into the Rodian, Echo leg swept another man, and then tossed a vibroknife through the next one's shields, and in the neck. 

His power armored fist became coated in blood as he repeatedly pounded the Ungrila merc he had leg swept, caving his skull in. 

Hardly out of breath, he steadied himself, and retrieved his weapons. Slotting the knife back into place, he slightly shook his head. Hunter would never let him live it down if he discovered this. Several more explosions rocked the building, eliciting a dry laugh. Wrecker had likely already destroyed the hangar, now this was overkill! 

Meanwhile, from the big man's perspective, he was having the time of his life. He had crawled through the sewers, and muscled his way through durasteel grates all for this moment. 

“Hahaha, go boom, boom!” 

A cascading chain of explosions that turned fuel lines into rivers of fire shook the entire building. The blast tore through the hangar deck, hurling shuttles into the air like toys before ripping them apart. The shockwave thundered through the palace, buckling walls, throwing guards off their feet, and sewing chaos. 

Wrecker stood at the edge of the inferno, laughing as flames rolled skyward, and tickled his armor. Behind him was a shuttlecraft that he had stolen. The AA guns were outside the palace. No one said he couldn't fly inside. Piloting the armored craft thick enough to carry the most important, richest Hutt, Wrecker was practically flying a fortress! 

Bombs rained down upon palace staff, and powerful turrets raked columns, walls, and support beams indiscriminately. 

“Boom! Boom!” Wrecker laughed repeatedly to himself, and broadcasted his deep baritone through the shuttlecraft's speakers as he terrorized the palace. 

A squadron of mercs opened fire on him, only for the big man to bug splat them on his windshield. 

On the palace spires above, Tech watched the chaos unfold through a stolen control node. Witnessing the armored shuttlecraft, he could only purse his lips. Of course, who else would do such a reckless stunt other than Wrecker? 

Getting back to work, his fingers flew, rerouting targeting matrices, and rewriting friend-or-foe protocols in real time.

The sky filled with incoming ships: Hutt gunboats, hired escorts, and mercenary craft, all rushing in to protect their employer.

The anti-air batteries pivoted with a whine, and opened fire.

Green and red lances of energy crisscrossed the smoggy air, tearing into the incoming fleet with merciless accuracy. One ship vanished in a blossom of flame. Another lost an engine and spiraled into a tower. Pilots screamed over open comms before those too were cut off. Various missile bays in the skyscraper's super structure opened up, and began to take the larger craft out of the air. 

“Hostile air support neutralized.” Tech reported calmly, as if commenting on the weather.

In the upper corridors, Crosshair had already inserted himself, waiting patiently for this very moment. 

He moved unseen, his camo cloak bending light and shadow into nothingness. Officers never saw him, never heard the shot that ended them. A lieutenant barking orders dropped mid-syllable. A security chief slumped over a railing, his command pad clattering to the floor. Each kill removed another node of authority, another chance for the palace guards to recover or mount a counterattack. 

As the leadership dropped one by one, the men guarding critical checkpoints began to waver. Morale was plummeting, and when the guy who threatened your whole family with execution lay dead less than five feet away, the fear towards the Hutts wasn't quite as potent as the fear they felt towards this invisible killer in the dark. 

Crosshair didn't report in with his brothers. Instead, he remained silent, not bothering to waste his breath. He was born to kill. So that's what he would do. 

Emerging from a crouch, he covered a man's mouth, and plunged his knife between his ribs. Letting the body down softly, he swiftly repeated himself eight more times. It wasn't until the last merc in the squad felt a chill on his back that he turned around, only to see all his buddies were folded on the ground, and a black helmet inches from his face. The merc's eyes widened, and he tried to raise his blaster, but he was too slow. 

As Crosshair withdrew his blade, he shook his head in disgust. 

“I'm getting sloppy.” 

Meanwhile, at the front gates, Hunter walked straight into the thick of it. 

Blaster fire flashed across the entry hall as guards scrambled, disorganized and leaderless. Hunter moved through them with the grace of a ballerina. His vibroknife flicked out, fast and precise: throat, joint, power pack. One body hit the floor after another. 

“Come on men, we can go deeper!” Hunter urged the scum who had been waiting outside to join Gora's forces. 

They glared murder at him, but to the official palace guards, Hunter, and this group of newcomers were all part of the same unit! Their blaster bolts were aimed at both Hunter, and these prospective hires! 

Hunter chuckled as he led this mob of desperate survivors forwards. He never broke stride as he confidently rushed the enemy,  not a single step was wasted in this assault. His beskar armor took glancing blows, seemingly invincible to those who shot at him. 

To the guards, he was exactly what he claimed to be: a Mandalorian mercenary, here to collect blood and credits! 

Within minutes, the palace’s outer defenses were shattered. Hunter twirled his knife, and glanced behind him, finding dozens of corpses, and not a single man left alive. 

Whistling to himself, he checked his chronometer, and the log. Seeing that everything was on time, he confidently strolled down the red carpet, passing by huddled noncombatants without a care in the world. 

Echo breached the final corridor from below, smoke and sparks trailing behind him. Wrecker smashed through a side access with his heavily armored shuttlecraft. Tech rerouted power away from sealed blast doors, popping them open one by one. Crosshair emerged from the dark, like a shadow meeting daylight. 

Their paths converged, and the brothers nodded at one another. Less than 15 minutes had passed since the assault began, and now they were standing before the final obstacle to their objective. A massive blast door leading to the central chamber was all that protected Gora from their rampage. 

“Well done, lads. Not even Delta Squad could've done better.” Hunter encouraged his men. 

“Statistically speaking, they have-” 

“Bah, enough with yur science jargon, Tech!” Wrecker rudely interrupted. 

“What is the General's ETA? Will he be here in time for extraction?” Echo asked. 

Hunter checked his instruments, and nodded. “Five minutes. He had to drop off the kids, remember? Says he's bringing a little surprise with him too.” 

“Lovely. His surprises have always been a net positive.” Crosshair practically hissed, and felt at his chest where a lightsaber had pierced him once upon a time. 

Hunter rolled his eyes at his cynical compatriot, then turned to Tech. “And the AA batteries? Are we going to lose the General before he can even step foot, and witness our masterpiece?” 

“The IFF code has been transmitted.” Tech glanced down at his datapad, reconfirming that they had indeed been sent. 

“Are ya babies gonna keep yer chatterin away, or am I free ta blast the blasted door already?!” Wrecker all but roared. 

“Door's all yours, big man.” Hunter grinned, and invited him to go ahead. 

Wrecker wore a big, childish grin, as he unloaded all over the thick door. 

After several explosions, it collapsed inward with a mighty thud. 

Hunter stepped into the chamber first, vibroknife humming softly in his hand.

Behind him, the Bad Batch moved as one.

The Bad Batch-sans Wrecker-flowed through the breach in practiced formation. Every angle was covered, any slight movement would receive the fury of the best that the galaxy had to offer. 

What they found inside was incredibly shocking. 

Massive bodies lay strewn across the marble floor, their sheer bulk was unmistakable. What they found were slugs the size of speeders, that was the target. However, they were silent. Their mouths were slackjawed, and eyes wide in terror. Jeweled adornments were scattered amongst pools of darkening blood. 

The Hutt Ruling Council was dead. 

He sent a picture of the scene to Corvus, and received a reply. 

[ETA 1 minute]. 

Despite the ‘reassuring’ message, Hunter couldn't help but something was off, he had a bad feeling about this. 

Echo knelt beside the nearest corpse, scanner sweeping methodically across the fallen giants. “Biometrics match. All are confirmed targets. The Council’s been wiped out.”

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.” Wrecker growled from within the cockpit of the shuttlecraft. “We fight our way through half the moon and somebody else beats us to it?! I’d love to meet the kriffing glowstick who did this. Give’em a real taste o professionalism.” The big man said, whilst gripping the controls so tight, they might break. 

Tech was silent as he adjusted his goggles, trying to make sense of the crime scene. He toggled to a different spectrum, his lenses hummed as the world shifted into sharp contrasts and alternating types of light. His gaze lifted toward the far end of the chamber, where a raised dais loomed beneath some banners.

“There are traces of distortion energy…and a faint particulate displacement consistent with recent foot traffic leading upward. It appears we may not have to wait long to satisfy Wrecker’s desire for confrontation.” Tech stroked his chin, and said in an academic tone. 

Hunter, meanwhile, had gone still. The air smelled wrong. 

“Something smells funny.” Hunter quietly muttered, and glanced to the side. 

Crosshair met his eyes, and was already raising his rifle. He followed Hunter’s line of sight without a word, sighting in on the shadowed edge of the dais.

Without any more delays, the sniper rifle released a high powered round. 

The bolt screamed across the chamber and shattered a holoprojector. 

An illusory wall suddenly winked out, revealing two figures waiting in the shadows. 

One had crimson skin etched with black tattoos, yellow eyes burned with malevolent curiosity as he stared them down.

It was:

Darth Maul!

Beside him stood a massive, hulking figure rippling with muscle. His presence was heavy, and oppressive. A crimson blade flared to life as he leaned forward, he licked his lips in anticipation. The black robed Hutt's aura pressed outward, thick and suffocating.

The air seemed to tighten around them, and as Corvus ran onto the scene, flanked by his two students, Maul began to slow-clap. 

“Well.” Maul said smoothly, voice edged with amusement and menace. “How considerate of you to join us.”