Splitting Hairs

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"How are we going to take the Krayt Fang? Spaceport control and the hanger are probably guarded heavily in this town," says Elenga. "Not to mention that we need space control to undock it."

The Blood Moon Bandits knew they needed to act fast. They had three dead gommoreans in their wake and Teemo breathing down their collective necks. It's so hard think in this heat.

"Let's Split up!" Ushut says

The BMBs decide to split up and name the teams creatively team one and team two.

Team One: Leyli, Elenga and CU-DL are assigned to disable the docking clamps for the Krayt Fang inside the space control center.

Team Two: Brando, Ushut and Quyn race to the dock to secure the Krayt Fang and repair the ship with the Hyper Matter Reactor part.

Elenga is noticeably nervous about this and they make way to the Space Control Center. If she had pores they would be dripping with sweat right now. They notice a side door and use their honed mechanic skills to easily get inside. They are greeted with a deserted room and regulated air control. The humming of electronics whirs on the other side of the other door in the room. Elenga presses her ear against the door desperately searching for any clues as to what awaits them on the other side.

"It sounds like computers are on the other side!" Elenga loudly whispers.
CUDL could not muster any sarcasm yet because it was not programmed with such conversation extensions in its programming. But, after she said that, it realized that it wanted to say something about that obvious statement. It could only at that moment give a frustrated beep. After looking at the blank stare if CUDL for a few moments they decided to open the door quietly. Ley'li pulls her blaster out of her holster getting ready to force themselves in. They peer in and see a single officer surrounded by a few droids in an open control room. Facing the windows to the desert, the officer gives permission for an imperial ship to land.

With the officer's attention elsewhere they try to go to a computer closest to their door and access the docking systems. It's too quiet in the room to not go unnoticed. At least that's how Team One felt. Somehow they are able to splice into the computer and initiate the release docking protocol for the Krayt Fang.

A silent alarm trips.

The officer jerks her head over to the computer by Team One's area and she walks over to them. Instinctively, Leyli holsters her weapon before she arrives at the computer station.

What are you three doing here? I didn't authorize an undocking procedure, explain yourselves. she sternly says. They immediately knew that she was a thorough type of person with how she presented herself to them. They could not give a halfhearted answer here. If they didn't succeed here, it was all over for everyone.

Team Two try to hurriedly walk to the dock from the space control center after dropping off Team One.

The wind already was picking up the deeper they went into the city. Each alley was its own private vortex of sand and food smell. The grill nearby was wafting its enticing smells throughout the northeast part of Mos Shuuta.

As they cross the first alley the see a giant water tower. Brando shudders looking at it knowing that there is so much water high above them. Like a three ton tsunami frozen in time. He shakes his head trying to convince himself that he is braver than that. After all he left his home planet which is more than most of his kind can say.

"There they are! Get them!!!"

After hearing that they all look around and there they are. Storm Troopers. At the end of an old alley they had just crossed.

"I knew I should have worn a cloak or something," Ushut says looking at his outfit disappointingly.

"More trouble by the slag works," says Quyn. "But it looks like they haven't seen us like the other group has."

This is not the time to slow down, Brando thought. We have to keep moving and lose these guys. He looks at the water tower again.

"FINE!" he groans loudly, closing his eyes and throws two grenades over to the two northern supports for the water tower.

The explosion goes off and dust goes everywhere. Everyone starts to scatter and scream in confusion.

Though Brando looked disappointed that the bombs did not spill water towards the troopers and wash them off the plateau, he secretly was so glad he didn't potentially drown.

"That's good enough! Lets get out of here!" Ushut yells.

They mix in with the panicked crowd and slide in between a local grill and power station. The hangar is in their sights.

They have arrived.

There are two droids at the entrance of the hangar.

"Let us through. We are delivering a part for the Krayt Fang. Don't make us late!" demands Ushut.

The droids just look at each other and beep a collective WONK sound and continue to stand there.

Ushut walks back to his group frustrated, "I got nothing, now what?"

"There, it looks like we can sneak behind them past those crates," Quyn says cool and collectively.

They are all trying to not make a sound or make sudden movements as they sneak behind the droids. Brando closes the hangar door behind them, Ushutwasho grinning as it closes completely. That grin quickly goes away after he turns around.

There were two more droids by the Krayt Fang and they had already noticed them breaking in.

---

"Well? Explain yourselves!" The officer raises her voice as she grows impatient
Leyli speaks up.

"We are with technical support testing monthly for docking systems. We are initiating that test now and verifying that it worked at the dock."

It seemed the answer worked enough as an explanation for her."Carry on then."
Which probably means that she didn't have enough clearance to verify the claim. Imperial bureaucracy. Sometimes it does have its benefits.

After breathing a collective sigh of relief, Team One leaves the way they came in. The door opens and it's chaos outside. Yep it seems someone has had more fun with grenades. The confusion is still going on enough to sneak past the storm troopers close to their door and sprint to the hangar. They hear fighting inside. It's Team Two, they are in trouble!

Leyli shouts, "We need to get in there quick!"

"There is a hatch for maintenance over there!" points Elenga.

They quickly access the metal hatch and find and crew elevator that they take down towards the hanger itself.

The elevator descends down and opens.

Ushut and Quyn are running towards the two droids to engage in battle. They move so fast that they get the first attack in. Quyn equipped with her shock glove on her left hand and the stolen Cudgel in the other races to the droid on their left. She tries to stun it but quickly dodges and shifts to her right. She swings the wooden axe toward the droid. But since it shifted location, she fails to connect fully. With his blast knuckles, Ushut swiftly throws a punch but misses and that pulls one his leg muscles.

A blaster sound comes from one of the droids and hits Ushutwasho in his shoulder. Before Quyn can turn to see what happened, another shot burst through and hits quyn in her side.

"Ah!" Ushut winces in pain looking at his shoulder. "I should have stretched."

Brando slides forward from the entrance to kneel and take aim. He fires a shot from his blaster and penetrates the left droid and the shot exits through its back. Sparks fly off it but it keeps in its engaged stance ready to keep going.

"We need to sneak on the ship and repair it. That way we can take off as soon as possible." Elenga says.

Team Two exit the service elevator and approach the Krayt Fang amidst the battle. The boarding ramp is already lowered.

Quyn lunges forth and extends her left hand toward a droid. She punches the droid where the laser shot through and sends an electrifying current throughout the droids body. The droid slumps as its systems crash and it collapses on the floor lifeless. Following her attack, Ushut punches the remaining droid with his blast knuckles. The droid takes the hit and raises its arm and shoots Ushut in retaliation. The blast hits his chest and he screams in pain. Ushutwasho is brought to his knees. The droid raises its arm again for another shot. Ushut closes his eyes.

A blaster sound goes off.

However, it didn't come from the droid. It came from the boarding ramp almost hitting Ley'li and Elenga.

Brando once again aims and takes a deep breath. He shoots. The blast hits the droid square in the head. The two droids had finally been neutralized.

Brando jumps from the hangar entrance down onto some crates by the boarding ramp and slides off them landing beside Elenga, Ley'li and CU-DL.

Leyli shoots her blaster up the ramp and hears someone yell in pain.

"It looks like we have guest on our new ship," Ley'li says looking at Brando.

Elenga takes a bolo and starts swinging it. She sprints up the ramp and throws the bolo. "Got him!" shouts Elenga.

The Blood Moon Bandits all make their way up the ramp. Trex is sweating from the pain. The ship was not powered on. The air was stale and smelled of burned skin from the blaster shots. Elenga checks for weapons, Trex nods toward a heavy blaster tucked in his pants. "Gross," says Elenga as she takes the weapon.

CU-DL chirps followed by a long beep.

"CU-DL askes if we should ditch him here before we take off", Elenga translates.

"Let's keep him... for now, let's get out of here." Brando glaringly says at him.

"AH!!!!" screams Trex as he receives a shock from Quyns glove.

"Oh... I guess that didn't work," said Quyn.

She shrugs and helps carry Ushutwasho to the cockpit and close the boarding ramp to initialize takeoff procedures.

"Right, first things first." Brando drags Trex to the engineering room closely followed by Elenga carrying the Hyper Matter Reactor replacement part.

The lights power on and air begins to circulate as they take off and leave the landing bay. As Mos Shuuta begins to get smaller and smaller in the viewports, they exit the atmosphere of Tatooine.

Four small beeps ring in the cockpit. As Ushut begins to take a look, the whole ship shakes. Tie fighters are in pursuit. The ship lighting all turns red. Brando quickly snatches the part away from Elenga and installs it inside the engineering room. Even under stress from attack, Brando still takes pride in his work. This is all too easy. The HMR starts to charge. He stands back smiling at his beautiful work and then gets slammed against the wall from the entire ship shaking. The ship got hit again. Brando and Elenga begin assessing the hull damage to start repairs.

Ushut tries to fly to get in position as CU-DL and Ley'li go to the laser cannons. As they take their places two of the four tie fighters fly beneath the ship and fire again. Sparks fly in the corridors of the ship.

Ushutwasho yells in frustration, "Four against one are horrible odds!"

"Fire away Cuddles!" shouts Quyn.

CU-DL loved it's nickname as it has never had one before. All this action taken to survive was completely new to this lowly droid. Today has been so different from the other days. Each step taken vented its frustration from every hit, kick and verbal abuse from its previous owner. CU-DL fires the lasers from the bottom turret and slows down one the fighters.

At the same time, Ley'li shoots and obliterates one of the tie fighters. The debris from the tie fighter explosion damages the one next to it "One down three to go!" , Ley'li pumps her fist with excitement.

"I need more patches!" shouts Brando with pliers in his mouth. "Here you go!" Elenga throws them at him with one of her arms while repairing a wiring harness.

The two tie fighter below link weapons and fire. Everyone who wasn't seated gets knocked to the floor as if an earthquake was happening on the ship. Steam bursts from a spot in the ceiling.

"The ship can't take much more damage!" yells Brando in his comm link. CU-DL takes aim and destroys one more tie fighter. It beeps in excitement.

"Guys we have two more left. I can't jump to hyperspace yet. Take em!" yells Ushut.

Both CU-DL and Ley'li take aim and fire again. Both tie fighters explode and spin away into the void of space.

Through the silence, a notification sound pops up. The Hyperdrive is ready.

"It figures." rolling his eyes and he initiates a jump into Hyperspace.

"I picked an empty vector for us to jump to," says Quyn.

"Alright, let's get out of this lovely system," chimes Ushut.