NOW...

Caustic smoke filled the cabin. Alarms blaring, engines... roaring? No... failing. The crimson flash of emergency lights occasionally pierced the smoky dimness. Orin Jayce, coughing and squinting in the smoke, tried to see if the others bound along with him in the Imperial prison transport were at least alive. The others, two beings (a masked humanoid and a slightly larger quadrupedal humanoid), seemed to stir, if there were others it was hard to tell. The sound of the wind and the engines began to increase in pitch. Oh good. We're in a dive.

Jayce piped up, choking out a sarcastic laugh. "At least the inertial dampers seem to be wor..." Then blackness.

BEFORE...

uWAAAA... uWAAAA... uWAAAA... The insistent alarm yanked Jayce from his dreamless sleep shortly before his wingmate yanked him from his bunk. FeilV'risk'Arelith, a young female Chiss with close-cropped hair dressed in a TIE pilot's jumpsuit, tossed Jayce his flight gear.

"You are going to get us written up for dereliction of duty. Again." The calm, matter-of-fact statement was, Jayce knew, the equivalent of other beings shouting in rage. 

"Ow! Risky!" Jayce exclaimed. "You weren't exactly in a hurry either," he nodded toward the unkempt bunk.  Taller than average cadets, Risky stared at Jayce. Her glowing red eyes, unreadable to most, shone angrily. 

"You are quickly becoming a mistake I cannot escape, Orin Jayce." She stated as she exited the bunk chamber.

"You're the best wingmate ever, Risky!" Jayce shouted after her, smiling to himself as he dressed.

NOW...

"It's good to see a smile on your face. I was worried for a moment that you may have died." A masked being, different from the one he had spied through the smoke, leaned close to Jayce, fussing over him. Despite the alarming appearance of this being, he seemed to radiate a sense of calm assurance.

Jayce relaxed. A Kel-dor. Don't see that every day. "Thanks. I think." Jayce carefully got up from the floor with the help of the Kel-dor. Looking around the cabin, he saw that the other occupants were already up and poking around. "Any landing you can walk away from, right?" 

Nobody responded.

"At least we landed right-side-up." Jayce shrugged to himself.

The Quadrupedal humanoid, upon closer inspection, resembled a fathier with a humanoid body where the head would normally be. He also appeared to have horns. He noticed Jayce staring. "I'm a Chironian, you can stop staring and help us find a way out of here."

"Oh, sorry. Yeah." Jayce shook his head and began to investigate his surroundings. Looking around for a moment, he saw no access panels for the doors on either side, nor the comm on the wall. "Yup, we're definitely stuck on a crashed prison transport."

"Are all humans so astute?" the Chironian quipped to the Kel-dor.

"They have their charms," the Kel-dor responded.

"What about this guy?" Jayce gestured at the other being, leaning on the hull. He was wearing red body armor, his masked face tilted slightly down, seemingly lost in thought.

"I'm thinking." His voice buzzed with a slight mechanical distortion through the mask he wore.

Jayce turned to the others and shrugged, "Okay, then."

For several fruitless minutes, the four inspected every inch of the hold with no results. After what seemed like ages, the intercom crackled and sparked.

Over the speaker, the familiar sound of a click, then a voice filtered through an Imperial stormtrooper helmet. *click "Any of you alive back there?" click*

The red armored being perked up and moved briskly toward the comm panel. "Hey, we're fine. My fellow guests and I would appreciate it if you would open the doors. We would rather not burn to death today."

BEFORE...

Jayce ran awkwardly through the corridor leading to the huge briefing room, fumbling with the last of the straps on his flight gear. As he crossed the threshold, he felt overwhelmed seeing all the other cadets assembled at once. He made a conscious effort to avoid craning his neck like a yokel at the massive screens and viewports above. The cavernous briefing room, which sat at the top (at least relatively speaking) of Foundry Station, was the beating heart of this fledgling training program between the ISB and the Imperial Navy. The station itself was carved into a gigantic asteroid, floating along with its fellow space rocks, orbiting a purposefully uncharted red-giant star. 

"Oh, good. You're here. I thought we were all too early." Risky stated coldly as Jayce fell into line next to her.

"Why did I teach you sarcasm?" He panted, short-winded from the run.

A barely noticeable twitch of her lips let Jayce know that Risky thought it was funny, and that she was not as angry as he thought she would be. 

A broad smile was growing on Jayce's face until Risky's elbow found his ribs. Looking down, Jayce noted the rapid flurry of subtle hand movements. A covert language her family had been using for ages, which she had taught Jayce as they had become closer. Look sharp. Here comes the higher-ups, he translated mentally as he snapped to attention.

Commander Blaight, the station's lead flight instructor, entered the room. He was larger than average for a human male, which made many cadets wonder how he could fit into a TIE fighter cockpit at all. And even though he was middle-aged, he beat down many cadets in hand-to-hand training. He had earned the respect he was given and made fools of those who misjudged him.

Alongside the commander was a young woman, not much older than Jayce and Risky, in a deep crimson uniform. She was Ysanne Isard. She was the ISB liaison at the Foundry and the daughter of the ISB's Deputy Director, Armand Isard. Despite whispers of nepotism, she had proven herself to be exceptionally qualified, even more than some agents twice her age. She stopped before reaching the central platform and took a moment to speak with the leader of the Crimson Squadron, Pitur Finnik. She laughed at something he said and playfully slapped his chest before moving onto the platform to rejoin Commander Blaight.

Jayce spared a look at Risky, who had built up the kind of rivalry with Isard that only wealthy scions could. Her hand flashed in rapid, subtle movements. We should break her new toy.

He signed back. They could both use an ego check. 

They both turned their full attention to the central platform and the large spinning hologram of a unique-looking TIE fighter. The blue, semi-transparent image was a TIE, but the familiar hexagonal panels were gone. Replacing them was a set of inwardly angled dagger-like panels. The specifications of the vehicle began to be listed alongside the image, and an impressed murmur spread through the briefing room.

Jayce, unable to contain himself, burst out, "Dank farrik!" 

"Dank farrik indeed, cadet Jayce!" Boomed Commander Blaight. The room's PA system needlessly boosted the volume of his voice. Blaight paused to allow a bit of laughter to pass through the crowd, but ended it abruptly. "This!" He barked. "Is the TIE interceptor! We have been given the privilege of helping the data-slugs over at Seinar turn their guesses into actual, real-world numbers!"

Risky, in an unusual breach of protocol, quickly gave Jayce's hand an excited squeeze.

Squeezing back, Jayce smiled.

"Wing One, 'Glory Wing'," Blaight snapped. "is comprised of the following squads!" A holographic list appeared above his head. "Crimson, Gold, Midnight, and Purple! You will be flying the new TIEs" He paused for a breath. Then, continued. "Wing Two! You will play pirates today! 'Mynock Wing!' Orange, Vermillion, Blue, and Flame squadrons! Thanks to the leader of Orange Squadron, Cadet Jayce's lack of punctuality, you will be flying the following motley collection of barely space-worthy junk craft." A hologram of a random assortment of outdated fighters appeared above the platform. Older craft, such as Z-95s or scrap-hybrids (colorfully referred to as "Uglies" by pilots across the galaxy).  

The cadets of 'Mynock Wing' turned to Jayce, their eyes filled with frustration and anger. Risky stared straight ahead. Jayce knew she would 'discuss' this with him later.

__________

The mismatched assembly of spare parts designated 'Mynock Wing' flew in a large formation around the Foundry.

"The climate control in this thing is busted, but at least the shields are functional." Jayce mused. His breath condensed into mist as the edges of the canopy frosted up. 

"The shields are fictional," replied Risky. "Mathematical abstracts to absorb the low-powered laser blasts from our vastly superior opponents."

"Superior." Jayce scoffed. "The TIEs maybe..."

"Flame Leader to Wing Commanders. Does anyone have a plan to avoid being wiped out in record time today? These things handle like a three-legged dewback." Flame leader, Cassidy Hull, was a competent pilot. To hear him stressing out before a mission was disheartening. 

Jayce and Risky responded in unison, "I'm working on it."

"Can we work faster?" Blue leader, Lina Durand, chimed in. "The astromech they gave me keeps swearing at me in at least seven languages."

"Orange Leader to Vermillion Leader, any ideas?" Jayce asked, a hint of sarcasm in the question.

"Can we just hide under our bunks?" Orange Leader, Gerrin Veks, responded in kind.

"Interesting notion," responded Risky.

"You got something, Orange Two?" Jayce asked.

"We could move into the asteroid field. Using the reduced space to hinder the speed and mobility of the Interceptors." Risky stated.

Jayce sat up a bit in his cramped cockpit. "If we fly as close as possible to the bigger ones, it should mess with their target acquisition. Right?"

"Probably, but even better would be to land on the bigger asteroids and go into standby."

Jayce smiled to himself. When Risky went into tactician mode, it reminded him of why he was drawn to her in the first place.

"They won't be able to target what their scanners can't see!" Cassidy exclaimed loudly.

"Then we light them up as they pass," Jayce added. "They want us to play pirate, then we'll play." 

NOW...

*click "You are prisoners of the Empire. It is against protocol for me to open the hatch until we arrive at Prisoner Transfer" click* 

The Kel-dor shook Jayce gently. "Are you okay? Do you have a head injury?"

Jayce shook himself from his trip down memory lane. "No, just zoned out. Thanks, uh..."

"Bo Elik." The masked alien filled in the pause, his unreadable face somehow showing genuine concern for Jayce's condition.