|
COMMANDER
PIETT'S FIRST SHIP On Coruscant, a landspeeder drives up to Coruscant's Imperial Palace. Inside are an anonymous Royal Guard and Commander Piett. GUARD: Relax, Piett. It's just your first audience with the Emporer. Not like your CO is getting choked or anything. PIETT: I know, but being told to command a Victory Star Destroyer just because he likes my accent? I mean, what if he's...not on the galactic path, if you know what I mean? The Imperial Guard begins drooling. GUARD: If only... PIETT: Shut up, you're not making this any easier! And that's leather upholstery, stop drooling! The Landspeeder arrives at the palace. The first guard and a stormtrooper escort Piett up to the Throne Room STORMTROOPER: Ignore my colleauge there, he's just not feeling well, I'm afraid. Ever since the Emporer turned him down for a movie and dinner, he's been like this. GUARD: Hey! He did not turn me down! He had other plans. STORMTROOPER: I'm sure he did. PIETT: You two just shut up, I'm a bundle of nerves now! STORMTROOPER: You should try the caffiene liquified nerve booster. It's better known as 'coffee', there's a coffee machine on the Hiccup, your VSD. PIETT: Nope, no coffee for me now or ever. Heard it does stuff to you. They arrive at the Throne Room, and the Stormtrooper leaves. The Guard, another guard, and Piett kneel as the Emporer enters through his private door. EMPORER: Rise, my servants. They rise. GUARD 2: Servant? I take offense to tha...gaaaaaak! The Emporer shoots lightning at Guard 2, who crumples to the ground, dead. PIETT: Geez, that's gotta hurt! EMPORER: It does. Congratulations, Commander, on being put in command of the VSD Hiccup. We'll only leave you there long enough to replace you with Captain Ozzel, so, you have a week. Use it well. GUARD 1: Use it to bomb this place and kill that old hag. EMPORER: I heard that! GUARD 1: Gaaaaaak! The Emporer shoots lightning at Guard 1, who crumples to the ground, dying. GUARD 1: Does...that...mean...you're...busy...Tuesday...gaaaaak! The Emporer finishes Guard 1 off with another burst of lightning. Piett looks on, horrified. EMPORER: That's two down today. Damn, they cost 150 credits each. PIETT: I see, lord. EMPORER: Dismissed. Commander Piett leaves, and goes off via Lambda Shuttle to his ship, the VSD Hiccup. On his way to the Control Tower, he meets his Executive Officer, Leuitenant Pineapalt PINEAPALT: Sir! PIETT: Hello...Pineapalt, is it? Any relation? PINEAPALT: No. I'm sick of people asking me that! I have to tell them over and over and over! I am NOT related to Mon Mothma! PIETT: I see. ***leaves*** PINEAPALT: Well, the bridge is this way, not that way. Sucker. Pineapalt walks that way...and finds himself at the gunnery chamber. PINEAPALT: Aaaaagh. Pineapalt walks back to the control tower. On the bridge... PIETT: Hello, fellows. I'm Commander Piett, your commander of the week. D4-Q9: I am D4-Q9, Human-Cyborg relations. And this is my counterpart, Ensign Nearmiss NEARMISS: Stupid droid! I save him from the scrap pile in order to get a servant, and all of a sudden I'm his counterpart. Coffee, sir? PIETT: Never drank it, never will. NEARMISS: Aaah, one of those guys against coffee? Thrawn appears on the communications holo. Piett rushes over. PIETT: Sir! ADMIRAL THRAWN: Commander, we have an urgent job for you. PIETT: Say the word, sir, we're your ship! THRAWN: We require garbage haulage, twenty tons to the Ithor system. PIETT: What?!? PINEAPALT (entering): Perhaps they didn't tell you, sir, the Hiccup is a garbage scow! PIETT: Aaaagh. ENSIGN RAMMINGSPEED: Shall I lay in a course sir, once the garbage is loaded aboard? THRAWN: It's already on. Proceed immediately. Thrawn's holo disappears. PIETT: Might as well, and get me a coff...get me a water. NEARMISS: Water? Sir, there's no alcohol in water! PIETT: Water, I said. D4-Q9: Yes, sir. D4-Q9 gets Piett some water. The VSD Bubbles goes into lightspeed. Time passes. They arrive at the Ithor system. RAMMINGSPEED: Sir, we have arrived. PIETT: Excellent. Dump garbage, Ensign Nearmiss. PINEAPALT: Sir, may I remind you... PIETT: Silence, Pineapalt! PINEAPALT: Yes, sir. NEARMISS: Dumping garbage... Garbage spews out of the Hiccup and lands on the capital city of Ithor. Millions of rebel Ithorians die. PIETT: Very well. RAMMINGSPEED: Commander, large smuggler fleet coming out of lightspeed ahead! The sensor display shows dozens of YT-1300, YT-2400, and even the occaisonal Corellian Corvette and Z-95 Headhunter. PIETT: Shields up. Fire at that Corvette. The Bubbles opens fire upon the Corellian Corvette Puke, which is destroyed. But it does not have much luck with the corvette Stuff. NEARMISS: We're being fired upon badly! Shields down to 70% and dropping rapidly! PIETT: Take out fighters! Several Z-95s are destroyed. One spirals towards the Hiccup's control tower, out of control. PIETT: Intensify forward batteries, I don't want anything to get through. Several Z-95s and a few YT-1300s, not to mention the Stuff, are destroyed, but not the out of control fighter. PIETT: Intensify forward firepower! PILOT: Aaaaaaaaaaah! PINEAPALT: Too late! The Z-95 slams into the bridge...or would have, had it not been for the fact that the shields there were still quite up. PIETT: Whew. That was close. Continue firing! More smuggler craft are destroyed, but they keep on coming. Bits are blown off the Hiccup's hull. Lots of pieces. NEARMISS: Why are they attacking us? PINEAPALT: Because we shot first. NEARMISS: Oh, yeah. That's ri... Laser blasts strike the now unshielded bridge. Thanks to his inattentiveness, Nearmiss' weapons console explodes in flame! NEARMISS: Aaaaah! Nearmiss dies of shock. PIETT: Call the turret gunners. Tell them to fire all weapons. RAMMINGSPEED (trying frantically to keep the ship under control): Sir, we have no shield control! They've gone down by default, we're a sitting duck! PIETT: Do we have fighters? PINEAPALT: No. PIETT: Blast. The entire front end of the Hiccup is blown off, taking with it several turbolaser batteries. More ships are destroyed in response, but several are still left. D4-Q9: Actually, we have one TIE Fighter inside the Docking Bay... PIETT: I'll take it! Pineapalt, control the ship! Piett's TIE Fighter flys out. PIETT (in fighter): Come on, you ingrates, do your worst! Assisted by supporting fire from the almost-but-not-quite crippled Hiccup, the superior Piett destroys ship after ship after ship. Before long, they are all destroyed, but Piett suffers a clipped solar foil in his final efforts. PIETT: I'm hit! Piett's TIE Fighter spirals out of control...into the docking bay, where it smashes into a stormtrooper looking for him. STORMTROOPER: Ow! Piett climbs out. PIETT (to intercom): Bridge, let's head back. They do. After a long trip, Hiccup arrives at Coruscant, just in time to be commanded by Captain Ozzel. OZZEL: Thank you, thank you so much. PIETT: Someday, they'll get you for this. THE END
|
