Trooper

They Went WHERE?

It was quiet in the Grav-Lift as it shot our squad up to the detention area where the alarm had been triggered. Other than the coincidence that there was a high-value rebel prisoner in this particular block, we have no idea what sort of situation we're actually heading into. For all we know, the door is about to open to a pair of hardened battle-droids ready to cut us to pieces.

There's a slight rumble as the lift slows as we approach our destination. There is a mild tension amongst the squad but nothing beyond our normal encounters, why should this one be any different? Oh right... we don't want to actually shoot anything this time! But we need to look like we're trying, fun.

"Squad, remember, the objective is to allow them to escape alive, but they need to feel like we put up an honest fight. Don't get sloppy. But don't get cocky, they're still shooting at us for real." I quickly command to my fellow troopers before the lift comes to a halt.

The lift jerks to a halt. Seriously? We can build a space station the size of a moon that can blow up a planet, but we can't make an elevator that doesn't nearly throw you into the ceiling when it stops?

I hear the mechanical locks snap into place, standard procedure for the detention blocks of any Imperial vessel. Half a moment later the lift door blasts open. Did that door blast inwards or outwards? It's hard for me to tell, but a trooper immediately spills through the narrow opening and crumples to the floor. They're right on top of us!

Two troopers in front of me fire their blasters through the small opening, trying to push back the rebels enough so that we can at least squeeze out of the lift. There's so much blaster fire, how many rebels are we up against here? Though this was a mock mission I'm starting to feel a real sense of danger now given the tightly confined space I was trapped in. One trooper manages to get through the opening still standing, I take a chance myself and push past the trooper in front of me and charge through the door, blaster leveled and firing in a spread in front of me.

Once through the shattered lift door, my brain took in the anteroom we were now standing in. All the sensor hardware had been blasted, actually, most of the equipment in the room had been blasted to bits. Is it possible these rebels simply didn't know what they were shooting at? Regardless, the rebels had made off down one of the detention corridors. Plenty of random blaster fire shot both in and out of the corridor, none of my squad have yet witnessed how many rebels we're up against. Most of them are out of the Grav-Lift finally, much slower than I would have liked. My combat style is more of a quick, powerful sting, like a scorpion. I'm not happy with how my squad is performing on even this fake mission.

Over my comms I call out, "How are they going to be getting out of here?"

"Uh, trooper, our charts show no available exits for that block." I hear from an anonymous voice in my ear.

Dammit, somebody obviously hasn't thought this through. Our mission to drive them back to their ship has started out with us pinning them in a hallway with no escape...

"Trooper" I hear again in my ear. "Your squad needs to let them escape via your current position."

'And there you have it' I think to myself, the Empire just ordered me to die so we can let some rebels escape on a sham mission. This doesn't sit well with me. I'd be able to deal with death on a mission that was real, but this? No way!

Apparently the same was not true for some of my squad, however, as one trooper stepped clearly into the opening to the corridor only to be quickly shot multiple times straight in the chest. He crumpled to the floor smoldering. Nope, not for me. I angle my blaster around the corner and rapidly continue firing down the corridor, I know I'm missing but I don't care, but these rebels aren't going to take me without a serious fight.

I hear some shouting from down the corridor though I can't make out the words. They're still firing back at us but it's become more sporadic now. I see two more of my troopers have fallen to the deck, I can't tell the severity of their injuries but they're out of the fight either way.

Was that a growl?

Suddenly the blaster fire from the rebels stops. I carefully peek my head around the corner and look down the corridor. There's smoke from a few blaster burns on the bulkheads, but I otherwise see no signs of the rebels that were just firing at us. Did they take refuge in one of the cells? My tactical brain thinks that would seem a poor choice but then I'm not a rebel, am I?

I motion for one of my squad mates to move forward, he climbs a few steps up the stairs maintaining his crouched position, slowly panning the corridor with his blaster. After a moment, without diverting his eyes he says "All clear"

"All clear?" I ask. "Where did they go?"

"Command, have any of the cell doors in the detention block been opened in the last minute?"

After a few moments, I hear back a hiss of static and "Negative trooper. One cell, number 2187, was opened as you arrived, but none have been opened since you breached the detention block."

Now I'm confused. If they were trapped in a narrow corridor with no escape, and they're haven't opened the doors to go into any of the cells, where the hell did they go?

"Squad!" I call out, "let's make our way down the corridor, carefully, something here doesn't feel quite right. I want every inch of this corridor checked."

If only the rebels hadn't blasted the sensor arrays... I thought to myself, they'd be rather handy right now.

Another call over the comm "Sir, the corridor is clear, but we may have found something."

"On my way!" I bark into the comms, clearly, I'm done entertaining this fake mission of ours.

******

Staring at the gaping hole in the vent grate I shake my head.

"We didn't notice it during our initial sweep, but when we walked through again I thought I heard what sounded like shouting. I couldn't place it at first until I saw this broken vent cover."

"Do we know where this vent leads?" I ask my squad mate.

"I do not, sir."

"Have you asked our escorts?"

"My thoughts as well, unfortunately, they're both a smoldering mess back by the grav-lift".

Of course they are, no trooper trained by me would be so stupid as to willingly step in front of an active shootout.

"Command, we have a potential escape vector for the rebels, there's a vent cover that's been blasted next to cell 2187. I need to know where this particular vent leads."

"Trooper hold, checking the schematics."

A few moments pass, I'm growing impatient with this whole situation. I duck into cell 2187, is it possible there were any clue in here? Anything that could indicate who we're dealing with? Turns out, nothing at all. The cell is cleaner that a stormtrooper's bunk.

I feel I've been chasing this group for weeks, yet I still have yet to see a face, or anything for that matter, of this enemy. They are either unjustifiably lucky, or far more skilled than most of the folks I've been given the task of pursuing.

"Trooper." Oh yeah, I was waiting for an answer. "Our schematics for that sector are incomplete, we do not know where that particular vent goes."

"Fantastic!" the frustration wells in me even further.

I turn to my squad, "seems there's only one way to get things done around here." and I turn and dive through the chute myself, trooper armor, blaster and all.