Project Boussh: In The Line of Fire
By Josh Cochran

Josh's parachute dropped him to the ground like a sack of potatoes. He
quickly released the chute and rolled into a crouch. The parachute had
deposited him on a stone walkway along a grand promenade leading to a
massive ceremonial entrance to the High Palace. A cool breeze blew across
his sweat-covered body. The first orange light of the approaching dawn was
barely visible in the eastern sky.

An explosion behind him caught Josh's attention just before a wave of heat
rolled over him. Out at sea, the wreckage of his burning fighter had set the
oil spill on fire. The flame spread quickly, and within moments several
square miles of ocean were burning. The dancing flames cast an otherworldly
orange glow over everything they touched. Nightmarish shadows flickered
around the high palace and its imposing arched entrance.

Josh pulled the radio from his survival vest and tried to shake off the
primal fears inspired by his surroundings. He quickly reset the radio to the
mission frequency and pushed the transmission button.

"Terra Three, what's your location and situation?"

Immediately a very tired and very scared voice came back. "We're pinned down
under fire on the eleventh level of the central tower - the prison section.
Need any available backup here now!"

Josh glanced up and quickly located the palace's massive central tower
rising from the middle of the complex. It was an enormous round structure,
roughly the diameter of a football field, rising hundreds of feet into the
air before him. Small windows sparsely dotted the stone structure. He
assumed that the eleventh floor was the one where green and red laser
flashes were visible through the windows. "Hang on, Three. Be right there."

Josh reached for the blaster he'd used in stealing the fighter and found it
missing. Cursing, he pulled his Walther P99 from its shoulder holster and
chambered a round. Josh raced to the palace entrance and pulled with all his
might on the massive, two story tall wooden door. To his surprise it swung
open easily. Josh ducked back, expecting a barrage of enemy fire from within
the palace.

When it didn't come, Josh carefully looked around the door into a
three-story atrium inside the building. There were no soldiers visible. In
fact, the room before him seemed completely empty. He was quite thankful for
that. The balconies on each of the upper floors and the twin stone stairways
on either side of the ground floor would have made this a perfect place for
an ambush.

Josh raced across the open room and up the right stairway, then down the
main corridor leading to the central part of the palace. He met no
opposition at all along the way, and when he reached the base of the curving
staircase leading up into the central tower, he understood why. Dozens of
stormtroopers lay dead or dying, their white armor scorched black where
they'd been hit by blaster fire. Several were still moaning in pain, but
none rose to challenge him.

He also did not encounter any enemy fire as he flew up the stairs. He did
find many, many more stormtroopers, mixed in with a few native Mendellian
soldiers in battle gear. Someone had done a terrifyingly good job of cutting
through the forces arrayed against them. Josh was very glad indeed that
whoever it was, they were on his side.

Josh finally reached the eleventh floor, puffing from lack of breath and
with a sharp pain in his right side. As he pushed the door to the prison
level open, he could already hear the sharp whine of laser weapons down the
hallway. In front of him was a hallway that hugged the outer wall of the
tower, with two foot square barred windows spaced every ten yards on the
right side and solid doors leading to prison cells on the left. With his
pistol held at the ready, Josh set off down the hall.

A quarter of the way around the circle, Josh came up behind a squad of
stormtroopers with their backs turned to him, firing as fast as they could
in the other direction. By walking to the far outside edge of the hallway he
could see several shapes dressed all in black taking fire from both
directions. Another group of stormtroopers, hidden by the curve in the
hallway, were firing on them from the other side. Josh knew he'd found the
people he was looking for, and now understood perfectly the desperation in
Three's voice. With a squad of troopers on either side they couldn't move or
effectively return fire, and it was only a matter of time before they were
worn down enough that the stormtroopers would be able to overrun them.

With the stormtroopers' attention fully focused on the Terrans in front of
them, and the lack of peripheral vision in their helmets, they never saw
what was coming. Josh stepped back, aimed his pistol carefully at the back
of the closest trooper's head, and squeezed the trigger. While the white
armor they wore might protect a stormtrooper from a near miss by a blaster,
it did nothing to protect them from .40 caliber bullets.  The trooper in
front of him dropped instantly to the ground, a small black hole in the back
of his helmet and a pool of bright red blood dribbling out the front.

As confusion set in regarding the sudden death of their comrade, Josh wasted
no time in taking out the other four troopers. Without thinking, Josh
charged ahead and was nearly decapitated by a blast from the Terran
position. Josh threw up his hands and called out "Hold your fire! I'm here
to help!" When no further shots were aimed in his direction, Josh ran into
the group of black-clad Terrans and dropped to one knee in their midst. They
were huddled together against the inner corridor wall, carefully avoiding
blaster shots from the remaining stormtrooper squad.

"Who are you?" the closest one demanded. He recognized the voice as Terra
Three.

"A friend. Thanks for not shooting me."

Another of the group, a human male with an Australian accent, shrugged
slightly. "You're not wearing white."

Josh chuckled darkly. "Fair enough." For the first time, Josh really looked
at the people around him. Three and the Aussie were definitely human, but
the others were... No, it wasn't possible. "They're Ewoks!" he blurted.

The Aussie gave him an icy, distrustful look. "They do their job. Nothing
else matters."

Josh couldn't argue with the simple logic of that.

"Alright, now that our back's clear, let's do something about these guys out
front," said the Australian. "One. Two. Three!"

On three, all three humans and the band of Ewoks jumped out from hiding and
laid down a wall of fire that eliminated all the opposing troopers in a
matter of seconds.

"Cell 38! Come on!" Three yelled out, a huge smile on her face as she took
off running. The rest of the group joined her.

They skidded to a halt outside a door marked with a large 38. Josh stepped
forward and pulled the door open quickly, sensing the feeling of victory in
his new comrades.

And he was knocked flat on his back as a ball of muscle and gray fur came
flying out of the dark cell and hit him squarely in the chest. Josh tried to
fight back, but the creature on top of him had him pinned firmly to the
ground. Three more of the creatures burst from the cell and attacked the
rest of the surprised Terrans. Since they hadn't expected an attack, nobody
had a weapon ready. Soon all three humans and an Ewok were either on the
ground or pressed against the wall in the grasp of one of the gray animals.
Seeing this, the other Ewoks yubbed loudly and started bashing the
creature's skulls with the butts of their blasters. The Aussie, now pinned
against the wall with two hands wrapped tightly around his neck, choked out,
"Shoot....them....idiots!"

Josh looked up at the bloodthirsty eyes and snapping fangs only inches above
him and tried desperately to reach the knife sheathed at his right ankle.
The creature holding him saw what he was doing and snatched the knife from
its scabbard and pressed it to Josh's neck. "And now you die, son of
Palpatine!" the creature cried at the top of its lungs.

"Wait! Who are you?" Josh asked, desperately trying to delay the knife's
final thrust into his throat.

"I am Ahkrak clan Kimbar, son of the betrayed world of Honoghr, prisoner of
the Empire for untold years! And now I will have revenge! For myself, for my
comrades, and for all Noghri!"

"We're not the Empire!" Three shouted.

Ahkrak pressed Josh's knife even further into his throat until a dribble of
blood escaped from under it. "What do you mean?" he growled.

Josh choked air into his tortured lungs. "We're not part of the Empire!
We're fighting them. Who do you think has been doing all the shooting out
here!?"

Ahkrak looked around at the bodies of the stormtroopers littering the
hallway and for the first time seemed to truly notice the Terrans. Two were
dressed in black combat suits and the other wore a dark green flightsuit
with all manner of gear strapped to it. Not Imperial uniforms at all. He sat
back, pulling the knife away from Josh's throat, and barked something in
Noghri battle language. The other Noghri instantly pulled back from their
intended victims.

The Terrans likewise ceased struggling and moved as far away from the four
Noghri as they could. One Ewok, apparently missing the uneasy truce,
continued pounding a Noghri's skull with his blaster. The Noghri backhanded
the Ewok into the nearest wall. The Ewok hit the wall at full speed and slid
limply to the floor.

"If what you say is true, then you are not our enemies," Ahkrak said.

The Australian rolled his eyes. "No kidding. That's what we've been trying
to tell you."

Three stepped forward. "We're trying to rescue a friend of ours that the
Empire kidnapped. They came here and tried to take over our world, and
they've killed hundreds of our people."

The Noghri looked around the hallway again at the bodies of the Imperial
troops. Finally Ahkrak spoke up. "If you fight the Empire, we will fight
with you."

The three humans breathed a sigh of relief. "We should check the other
cells. Quiara may still be here somewhere." Three pointed out.

The group fanned out to perform a thorough search of each cell. Almost at
the very last cell, Josh opened a door nearly directly across the tower from
the one that had contained the Noghri. He was surprised to find that, unlike
the others, this one wasn't empty. "Three! Get in here, quick!" he called
over his shoulder.

Three and the Aussie came running and stopped just inside the cell door as
Josh walked further into the gloom. "Face! Alison!" exclaimed the Aussie.
"What happened?"

Face wearily sat up on the bed. "It's a long story."

Josh could tell at a glace that Face was physically unhurt. The other person
in the cell, though, was just as obviously critically wounded. A deep cut
ran along her side, soaking her clothing and the cot she lay on in blood.
Her right hand was badly bruised and swollen to twice its normal size. Shock
from pain and blood loss was the only thing clear in her eyes.

He rushed to her side and checked for a pulse. It was weak, but regular.
"Are you okay?" he asked gently.

"I will be," she responded, iron determination clear in her voice. She tried
to get up off of the cot and stumbled.

Josh put his arm around her back to help her stand. "Here, let me help you."

Alison stopped for a minute and looked up at Josh. "Please tell me this
isn't another dream."

Josh looked at her quizzically. "Not that I know of."

A grim smile spread across her face. "Good...now I'll finally get a chance
to kill him."

Josh was about to ask who she was talking about when they walked out of the
cell door and back into the hallway. The feeling of victory that had been
building in his gut turned to bitter defeat in an instant. The rest of the
team stood with their hands pressed against the walls of the corridor with a
strormtrooper guarding each one. Another squad of stormtroopers guarded the
cell door, their blasters aimed directly at Josh and Alison.

Josh's heart sank. He took a deep breath and helped Alison to stand weakly
on her own two feet. She looked none too steady. For that matter, Josh
himself wasn't feeling all that steady at that moment.

"Hands against the wall. Move!" the lead stormtrooper said.

Josh and Alison both turned as if to comply. Halfway through the turn,
though, Josh spun back and charged directly at the lead trooper. His wild
attack took the troopers completely by surprise, and it took them a split
second to get off a shot. In that moment, the Noghri turned and savagely
attacked their guards. Seeing this, the rest of the Terran force joined in
the viscious fight. Then the first two blaster bolts struck Josh, tearing
through his left shoulder and right thigh. The force of the blast spun him
around and sent him crashing to the floor. His head met the concrete floor
at full speed, and darkness closed over him.