Chapter 165 - Close Call

About four hundred meters away from the control tower, a group of containers was stacked upon one another in a say that seemed to be no space between them. However, there was a small opening, just enough for a slim person to squeeze through.

Sing reload her weapon, which was way more unusual than Dageer's. It was a slim and long sniper rifle called Adventurer Slugthrower Rifle. Its name was weird, but how it worked was even more. In an era where space battles, droid armies, highly concentrated energy beans and people with mental powers were common, this rifle still used projectiles.

Why Sing used it, or how she got her hands on it, no one knew. But she was deadly effective with it. Of the three shots she fired so far, only one missed, because the clone moved exactly when she fired.

She aimed the fourth shot, a clone helmet in her scope, when her heightened senses warned her of something. She ducked back, just in time to dodge two blue energy bolts. Without showing herself, she followed the lasers' path, and saw two clones on the railway of the control tower. A cold smile crept it's way to her face.

"They found me, boys. Let's begin this show. Kakaka..."

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Hound was gripping his DC-15S, and walking carefully. He could hear sniper shots at the other side of the docking zone, and he knew that at least three men had already died, and another was injured. Now, he and the eleven soldiers of the massiff unit were rushing to the west side to aid their brothers.

"Grrrrr..."

Hound immediately stopped when he heard Grizzer growl. The massiff had saved his life more than once, and he learned to trust the animal. He gave a discreet signal to his men, and they slowed down without stopping.

"What is it, boy? Where?"

Grizzer sniffed the ground, and when they arrived at a junction, turned left. There were sounds of fighting, and a man screamed.

Hound quickly followed the massiff, and found it biting hard on the arm of a Nikto. When he saw the clone, the bounty hunter tried to fire its pistol, but Hound was faster.

Looking at the corpse, Hound quickly scanned its face to see if he recognized him, but it wasn't on the list that Commander Thorn gave him.

"Back, Grizzer. Good job. Commander, Sing and the other two aren't the only ones here. I just killed another bounty hunter."

"Damn it! We already know where Sing is. We are getting to her, so..."

"Noooo!!! Ahhhhh!!!"

A scream interrupted Commander Thorn. Hound knew the voice. It was one of his men.

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Commander Thorn dodged under a leg swipe made by a female Togruta bounty hunter. At the same time, he used his own leg to bring her to the ground. One of his men used the butt of his DC-15A to knock her out, then helped the commander get up.

"This is the third one, commander."

"Tie her up, and keep moving. All of those are just a distraction orchestrated by Sing. We have to move while Thire and Dageer have her pinned down."

After a few rounds of attacks, it became clear that Sing hadn't just hidden on the docking zone, but prepared a deadly ambush. He received reports of at least five bounty hunters, none of which were Sing, Castas or Bossk. Clearly, Sing had asked - or rather, hired - for help. Because of the frequent attacks, he had lost more than ten soldiers between dead and wounded.

"Shshshshshshsh... What do we have here?"

The voice that suddenly appeared sent chills down his spine. Commander Thorn turned around and saw a Trandoshan looking at him maliciously while licking his reptilian lips. The clones instantly shot him.

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Dageer could see battles happening all over the docking zone as the clones were ambushed by bounty hunters. Sergeant Hound reported to be facing Castas, and had already suffered losses. Meanwhile, Dageer and Thire were pinning Sing down, but she somehow always managed to dodge their lasers, and, at the same time, shoot at one of the clones below.

Just when Dageer was reloading, he felt a tingling sensation. His sixth sense, honed over hundreds of battles, warned him that he was in mortal danger.

He rolled sideways, but the attacker still managed to draw a bloody line on his left side, making him grimace in pain. Dageer, however, ignored the pain, and turned around to see an Aki-Aki, a species that looked like a dried fruit with long fangs. The bounty hunter was holding the same vibroblade that almost killed Dageer.

"What the..."

Thire heard the commotion and got up, but before he could help Dageer, a shadow threw itself over him, and punched him hard. Still, the clone fought valiantly.

The IG-88 assassin droid that tried to kill Thire had its blaster knocked away when the lieutenant used it's own weapon to bash the droid. Dageer couldn't pay more attention to their fight because the Aki-Aki pulled out a blaster pistol, making Dageer dive out of the way when he fired.

Dageer caught the bounty hunter by surprise when he, instead of jumping away, jumped closer to the Aki-Aki, grabbing his legs and making him fall.

The sub-commander tried to grab his own pistol, the DC-17, but the Aki-Aki punched him using the butt of his own blaster. The pistol slipped out of Dageer's grasp, and fell through the catwalk and on the ground below. So, Dageer grabbed his enemy's pistol, and elbowed his arm, making him release it. And then he felt a sharp pain in his leg when he was stabbed again.

Both combatants released each other, and watched one another carefully. The Aki-Aki only had his vibroblade, but Dageer had no weapon.

He vaguely heard Thire yell, and saw, with the corner of his eyes, the IG-88 jump upon the clone, only to receive the latter's feet on its metallic chest, and be projected over the catwalk.

At the same time the droid crashed onto the ground, the other bounty hunter attacked Dageer. He made a simple stabbing motion, direct at Dageer's chest, knowing that the clone could barely walk. But Dageer was prepared.

When the Aki-Aki jumped over him, Dageer turned sideways, and the bounty hunter's vibroblade cut the air millimeters away from him. Dageer grabbed the stretched arm of the bounty hunter, and broke it, making it bend into a 'U' shape.

The bounty hunter couldn't stop his own body from moving forward, and the vibroblade that had drastically changed directions was buried in his own chest.

Green blood gushed out of the wound, drenching Dageer's armor, but he ignored it, and grabbed his NT-242 once again.

"Sir! You are wounded!"

"Leave it! Sing is killing them!"

Dageer fired his sniper rifle again, driving Sing back into hiding, but at least five more clones had died during the twenty or thirty seconds of battle that Dageer and Thire just went through.

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"Bossk, Castas, let's go! Our employees are going down quickly. New guy, you too."

Without caring about the bounty hunters she had hired, Sing pulled back her weapon, and left her spot through an opening in one of the containers.

She soon arrived at one of the exits of the docking zone. Dozens of workers and civilians were running around, trying to escape, but she soon saw her three associates.

"Hey! You, stop right the... Arghhh!!!"

A Coruscant Guard clone who saw her tried to stop the bounty hunter, but was interrupted when three metal blades appeared on his chest. Sing smiled.

"Well done, Hiigi. Now, let's go."