Stars of Glory

Chapter 6

Marcus stood on the main deck of the newly christened Enterprise and watched the stars flow past the window. The Star Destroyer had swallowed his command, as well as two other mercenary companies who had contracted with hi for space on board. Granted that was before he had told them he already had a new contract that was going to take them away from the main colonization effort. Interestingly, both commanders had agreed when they had found out, especially when it turned out they would for all purposes be operating independently in the new galaxy. The crews were ecstatic. The holds easily took the mechs with only a few modifications, and each crew member had secured a private bunk for his or her self.

The Millennium Falcon was docked in a private bay by herself, while several of the fighter docks had been converted for aerospace fighters. Marcus personally didn’t have any under his command, but one of the other two commanders fielded a rather spectacular fight for a private company. Apparently the company in question specialized in blitzkrieg strikes and recon missions, and the aerospace fighters had a greater operating range then a standard mech. This made sense to Marcus, and was glad that they had some operating fighters on board. He hadn’t been able to recruit any of the Rebel pilots, which meant he had a full complement of TIE fighters with no one to pilot them.

He heard movement on the deck behind him, and turned around. When he spotted Princess Leia approaching he couldn’t help but smile. There was just something about the woman that intrigued him. The smile quickly faded when he saw the rest of her entourage however. The two robots seemed a bit odd to him, but only because they had personalities. He was use to lifeless automatons, but here it seemed even a droid that did nothing but beeping and whistling had an opinion. It drove him mad, especially when the little bugger sat in the mech bay and tried to talk with his Atlas. What was worse, he thought his Atlas might be talking back. In front of the robots was the real source of his ire. He had been thrilled when he had been told that he would be escorting the princess to Bespin. He hadn’t been so thrilled when he had heard that Han Solo would be accompanying her. He and the rogue pilot had gotten along well enough at the beginning, but it seemed they both had the same goal. They both wanted Leia, which meant that one of them was going to make the other one very unhappy. Not necessarily a good thing when two men spend as much time around weapons as they did.

He turned back to the window as he waited for them to reach him. It was just another sign of how bloody huge this ship was. Onboard the old drop ship, which had been sold to the Falcons, he would have been lucky to have squeezed three people into the commander’s area. Here he had a bridge that was as big as well, a bridge. The consoles down below were manned by their normal crewmen, all of the imperials having chosen to switch over to his own command. This had been fortunate in a way, as it meant he now had a crew that was already familiar with their instruments. Not all of the imperials had been left on board however. The surviving storm troopers and security personnel had all been off loaded on Hoth, turned over to the Rebels as prisoners of war. The imperials who had switched sides weren’t getting a free ride though. There were three dozen security personnel dragooned from the various commands stationed on the bridge alone. There was another dozen or so stationed around the mess area and supply rooms, and all the armory codes had been changed. As a final measure, all of the bunks housing imperial turn coats had been locked open, so that they couldn’t hide anything from the roving patrols. Several of the ones he had eaten with had explained to him that as far as the Empire was concerned merely letting their ship get captured was a treasonable offense, but that didn’t mean Marcus was going to turn a blind eye to any extracurricular activities they might be working on.

Marcus watched as the stars slowly condensed from the solid bars of hyperspace to single pin pricks of light. It was something he wondered if he was ever going to get used to. He had never seen anything like it before. Some how, he doubted he would ever come across something like it ever again.

They entered the system only a few light minutes away from Bespin, and already Marcus was convinced it was a beautiful planet. They didn’t plot an approach to the planet itself though, preferring to hide the Enterprise on the far side of one of Bespin’s moons. It had been deemed prudent to hide the fact that there were people running around with Star Destroyers that weren’t in the Empire. In fact, that had been one of the reasons that the Millennium Falcon had been brought on the trip. It was expected that the sight of the familiar ship would keep Lando from freaking out and attacking the ambassadors on sight. They had heard reports of pirates in the area, and were hoping not to be mistaken for such.

Once they had reached their position, they began to prepare for their mission. It had been previously determined that a Talon class drop ship, one of the only ones on board, would be kept on standby in orbit around the planet. That way, if any problems arose during negotiations, Marcus and his lance could drop to the planet and host an evacuation of the Rebel negotiators. It was expected that any defenders on the planet would be ill equipped to deal with the battlemechs, as they were an unknown factor. There had been some protest, especially from Han, who pointed out that the Bespin tibanna facilities were built as floating platforms. The mechs would have a very limited operating range, and if they fell off both pilot and mech would be lost, which was not a good thing considering there was a limited quantity of both. Marcus had dismissed these claims, pointing out that the Atlas’s would be capable of operating at their maximum potential anyway. They had more then enough armor and weapons to hold a position, especially against the expected weapons. It was finally decided that in cooperation with the mech assault lance one of the other merc companies would keep a fighter flight on standby, to deal with the three dimensional combat aspects Bespin required. The only precaution for the drop ship would be to launch it an hour after the Falcon. Otherwise, it would sit there in orbit and pretend to be exactly what it was: a lightly armed and armored freight ship. The fact that this particular freight ship was carrying aerospace fighters and battlemechs would merely have to be ignored by Bespin air control. But that shouldn’t be a problem as they weren’t planning on telling them either way.

As the clock continued to countdown until mission time, Marcus was standing around the docking bay, making a general nuisance of himself. He kept trying to get himself onto the negotiation team, but to no avail. Not only would it have been difficult to get his Atlas on board the shorter freighter, but he really had no place at the negotiations, save as a representative of the Terran fleets, and there were already two such representatives on the mission. Both had been assigned by the Jade Falcons, but that was mainly because the Flacons had yet to apprise the rest of the fleet about this particular jaunt. It hadn’t really gone unnoticed that one of the two captured Star Destroyers had gone missing in the jump to the Yavin system, but for right now it was being ignored by the Falcons, either with no comments or by pointing out that it had been captured by a mercenary, and every one knew how untrustworthy they could be.

“Are you sure you’ll not need any help?” Marcus asked Leia for the fifth time in thirty minutes. Leia merely gave him an exasperated smile.
“Yes, Marcus, we’ll be fine! Lando has already accepted Han’s request to meet, though for the life of me I don’t know why.” Leia answered.
“Hey, Marcus, get a grip will ya? Everything will be ok, Lando is an old pal of mine. We get along famously!” Han reassured him from across the room. Han turned around and scowled. Marcus was standing way too close to the Princess for his liking.
“Well, ok then. Remember, if you get into any trouble, just give us the signal, and we’ll drop on them like a ton of rocks.” Marcus reminded the princess.
“Marcus, will you get out of here? Leave the princess alone and let us get one with the mission. Karl will be very unhappy with us if you end up getting roasted by the Falcon’s engines when we take off!” cried one of the Falcon ambassadors as he headed up the boarding ramp.
Marcus rolled his eyes at the comment. “Ok, ok, I’m going. Just…keep yourselves safe down there ok?” Marcus asked Leia.
“We will Marcus. Now go, or you’ll miss your own ship! Go!” She waved him away and Marcus nodded grimly and hurried out of the hangar. Han wandered over from the Falcon, where he had been working on the power couplings leading up to the guns. Leia looked at him and smiled as he came over, shaking her head.

“You know, there is something about that guy I just don’t trust.” Han remarked. He leaned over the console Leia was working at, bringing his body even closer to hers.
“Ha! You just don’t like him because he keeps trying to get close to me.” Leia claimed.
“That’s not true! Look at him! He’s the most down right corrupt pilot I’ve ever met!” described Han.
“Isn’t that a bit like a Twi’lek calling a Sullustan dishonest?” Leia asked with a smile.
“Hey, that’s not fair! I mean, c’mon, look at the way he dresses for crying out loud!” Han protested.
“Admit it Han, you’re just jealous!” Leia said. She snapped shut the console she was working at, grabbed her bags, and stormed up the Falcon’s gangway, leaving a flabbergasted Han Solo standing by himself.
“Why I never!” he exclaimed. Chewbacca looked up from the panel he was welding down and roared something to the exasperated pilot. “Oh come on Chewie, not you too!”

* * *

Sem Aj stopped as he passed the storage room on board the Gauntlet. He could swear had had heard some noise coming from the room, but there wasn’t supposed to be any one in there. It was supposed to be empty if he was recalling their load manifest correctly. He swiped his security pass by the door’s lock, and it opened with a quiet hiss. He walked into the dark room, the only illumination coming from the dimmed lamps several feet over head. He heard a thump from behind a stack of empty boxes and he headed towards them to investigate. He had gone no more then two feet when he realized that there weren’t supposed to be any boxes in the room at all. He turned around to go report this, but by then it was already too late. A pair of massive hands, made more massive by the battle armor they were encased in, reached out and grabbed his head. There was a faint cracking sound followed by a barely audible pop, and Sem’s head caved in as the gauntlets pressed together.

Several lights clicked on, as head lamps on the various Elemental suits became active. Sem’s decapitated body was the in the center of the pool of light, as five of the suits peered down at the dead man. Four more suits moved to flank the door, and one of them quietly connected to the door’s system and closed it.

“Damn it Jovan! We’re supposed to be keeping a low profile!” The biggest of the suits broadcasted.
“But sir, he realized there was something wrong! I could tell by the look on his face!” one of the suits protested. “If he had gone and reported us, we would have been screwed!” Jovan insisted.
“Aff, I know.” Commander Viod looked down at the slain officer, and wondered what to do. He and his men had been trapped onboard the Gauntlet when the ship had escaped the attack on Hoth. He had been in charge of one of the leading groups of Elementals, and he and the eight others had managed to board the battle ship just as she had begun to lift off. None of the others had made it however, leaving them in a rather sticky situation. They had managed to avoid detection so far, and had even managed to gather some food and other supplies. For now they were counting on the ECM units mounted in their suits to keep them off of the ship’s sensors, if it had any. They had been lucky to find a storage room big enough for the entire group, as well as their captured goods. So far they had even managed to stay out of site of the ship’s crew, up until now at any rate. He still wasn’t sure what exactly it was they were going to be able to do.

The facts, as far as he could tell, were as such. He had a total of nine Elemental suits at his disposal, including is own command suit. They were on board an enemy craft, crewed by an unknown number of hostiles. They were, as far as he was concerned, lost in the middle of an unknown galaxy. He had tried several quick broadcasts on his suit’s communication systems, but had kept them short to avoid detection, if it was even possible. He had received no reply, which meant they were no longer in range of an allied unit, all allied units had been destroyed, they were being jammed, or he simply had the wrong frequencies or security codes. As far as he was concerned, there were simply too many unknowns at the current time.

This left him with only three options as far as he could tell. His first option was to surrender. This was not an actual option as far as he was concerned, as no Clan warrior would ever simply surrender with out a fight, as such an action was possibly the most dishonorable imaginable. The only reason to do so was in the event of facing such massively over whelming odds that combat would ensure the destruction of all of his troops to the last man. Opposite was the option to launch all out attack. Such a thought did not thrill him, as he only had the nine suits, against an enemy of unknown numbers and capability. So that had left him with his third, and current option: wage a guerilla action in enemy territory, and hope not to get killed doing so. Now it seemed the war had started, with the death of a petty officer. His mind began to spin as fast as his genetics would allow. He had been born of the finest genetic tinkering the Clans could offer.

A plan quickly devoloped in his mind. Their first target was going to have to be communications. He wasn’t sure if the ship they were one was part of a fleet, or if it had received orders for detached actions, but either way he didn’t want it to be calling down help on them. Next up would the armories. Crippling the ship’s defender’s ability to fight back might be key. They would also need to find a way to seize and possibly hold one of the ship’s holds. They were going to need a way to dispose of the bodies. Destroying things would be the worst idea, as the captain of the ship would then order it to the nearest repair station or ship yard. Instead they were going to have to sabotage the equipment, while still leaving it in perfect working order. That was going to be the tricky part.

He looked down at the body and pondered for a moment. Perhaps they wouldn’t need to dispose of the bodies. He drew his combat knife, a large, alloyed blade meant to punch through the armor of battlemechs. It sliced through the dead man’s skin with ease. Viod liked to hunt when he had leave, and preferred to clean his own kills. This wasn’t much different in his mind. The other eight suits in his command looked on in sick curiosity as he skinned the Imperial’s corpse. He made one long cut down the center of the man’s body, then peeled the skin away from the underlying muscle. He peeled the skin back to the man’s arm, which he then tore from their sockets. He skinned those as well, so that by the time he was done he had three pieces of skin: the torso and legs, and one for each of the arms.

He turned next to one of the boxes the Elemental had already emptied, and began to break it into several pieces of differing lengths. Some were tiny compared to the others, only a centimeter or two long, and millimeters wide. Others were left at their full meter long length. Taking several of the shortest pieces he pinned the pieces of skin back together. He then took the two longest pieces and shoved one through the other, making a slightly crooked cross. He then took another box, inverted the cross so that the shorter end was down, and rammed it through till the hilt was against the top of the box. He then took another short piece and used it to pierce the top end of the cross. He looked at what he had created, grabbed another long piece, and used it to create another cross, this time at the top of the piece. He then took the flayed skin, and using three more splinters, nailed it to the cross.

He next turned to ruined corpse lying on the floor. It had began to leak blood from the arm sockets, but this he ignored that little detail. He reached down, and placing his hand through the corpse’s chest, he grabbed a hold of one of the legs. Satisfied that the corpse wasn’t going to shift on him, he tore the leg off, before repeating the actions with the other one. Once he was done, he flipped the now mutilated torso over. Using only two of the finger on his gauntlet, he proceeded to punch four holes into the back. Into each of these holes went a limb. He straightened all four of the body parts out, then flipped it back over, so that it looked like some sort of grotesque end table. His actions had caused a liberal amount of splatter, so that every thing with in a few feet was now decorated with splashes of blood. He scooped out the stomach and intestines, and proceeded to use the latter to create a spiral pattern under the corpse. The center was located in the middle of the pool of blood, and continued for several meters, before terminating in a heap of organs. Gently, he lifted the ruined remains of the head and carefully placed them into the empty stomach cavity.

Finally finished with the desecration of the corpse, he stood up, covered in blood and gore. Each of the eight suits under his command were staring at him. At first no one moved or said a word. Such actions as the commander had just performed were unheard of in the Clans. Finally, Jovan slowly and silently saluted. Each of the suits then performed in order, until finally, all eight of the suits were saluting. He turned to each one and nodded once. As he did so, they dropped their salutes and filed into two lines of four behind him. As they headed out of the store room turned abattoir, Viod had but one thought.

This was going to be interesting.

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A/N: Ok, so this update is a bit late. RL of late has been odd. Worse, my mind has been working on a way to bring the Gundam multiverse into all of this…