Meanwhile, Level 1315.
"Fives, we're at Greywire. Looks like they're still digging—haven't given up yet," Echo whispered through his commlink, eyes fixed on the cordoned-off tech shop from the shadows of a narrow alley.
Fives' voice crackled back over the line, low and composed.
"You know the priority. The underground lab must stay buried. Understood?"
"Understood," Echo replied. He cut the channel and turned to the figure beside him—a hooded clone in weathered robes.
"Let's move," he said.
Kix nodded silently beneath the hood, and the two disappeared into the foot traffic, weaving like ghosts through the crowded undercity street.
Greywire was surrounded—holo-tape shimmered in a bright perimeter as red-armored shock troopers swept the area, scanning every inch for leads.
Echo and Kix exchanged a look. One nod. No words.
Go.
Kix peeled off, slipping through the crowd until he reached a parked Republic BARC speeder. In one smooth motion, he mounted and kicked the ignition. The engine roared to life—and he was off.
VROOOM!
"Hey! Stop that speeder!" one of the guards barked.
Several troopers scrambled, leaping onto their own bikes and giving chase through the buzzing neon streets, sirens blaring in their wake.
Amid the chaos, Echo moved.
While the remaining guards shouted into comms and craned their necks at the growing pursuit, Echo slipped past the perimeter, ghostlike.
Inside, the store was dim and silent. Echo swept the room with trained eyes—no movement, no voices.
Too quiet.
They've found the backroom.
He made his way toward the backroom. The secret passageway open.
---
"Damn... look at this place. Never seen tech like this," one of the shock troopers muttered, eyes wide behind his visor as he stepped deeper into the sterile, gleaming lab.
Surgical machinery dormant, rows of cybernetic augmentations lay secured within reinforced crates, each tagged in a code unknown to even Republic systems.
"R9-KX, slice into their database. I want every file pulled and archived." The lieutenant's voice was sharp, authoritative.
The astromech gave a confirming beep-beep before rolling over and plugging its scomp link into the access terminal. The console flickered to life as streams of encrypted data poured into the droid's processors.
Then—
"Lieutenant! You're gonna wanna see this!" a voice called from the adjacent chamber.
The lieutenant followed the voice into a side room—a weapons testing range. Two troopers stood around a freshly cracked stack of crates, lifting out unfamiliar firearms with curious reverence.
"Slugthrowers," the lieutenant noted, lifting a heavy, matte-black sidearm. Its frame was sleek but archaic—like a relic and prototype in one. He raised it to the target range and squeezed the trigger.
Click.
Nothing.
He frowned and adjusted his grip, inspecting the firearm. Another try.
Click.
"Dud?" one of the troopers asked, puzzled.
"Try another," the other said, already cycling through the crate. None fired.
"They're locked. Require a smart-link to function," a voice said suddenly, not among them.
The lieutenant turned—confused.
"A smart-link? That's not standard protocol…"
Then his blood ran cold.
His two men were down—collapsed silently behind him. And standing where they had once been was a hooded figure, blaster raised.
Echo.
Zzap!
The stun bolt caught him square in the chest. His body convulsed violently before crumpling to the floor with a dull thud.
The lab fell silent once more.
With the underground lab finally cleared of hostiles, Echo moved like a ghost through the silence. He wasted no time, pulling a set of compact thermal charges from his satchel.
One by one, he planted them across critical support beams, data cores, and power conduits—each placed with surgical precision. He didn't just want this place buried. He wanted it erased.
His boots echoed lightly against the durasteel floor as he approached the central terminal.
His cybernetic arm hissed and unfolded with a faint mechanical whirr, revealing the scomp link hidden within. It snaked forward and locked into the terminal with a sharp click. Lights flared across the console.
Lines of encrypted code began to vanish—archives, designs, logs, communications. Nothing was safe. Not even corrupted junk files. Everything was being purged.
Then—beep.
Echo's head snapped toward the sound.
Not from his commlink.
It came from the unconscious officer sprawled nearby—Lieutenant Smoker.
A red light blinked on the comm device strapped to the man's wrist.
"Lieutenant Smoker, what's your status?" came a clipped voice over the open channel. Calm, but expectant.
Seconds crawled by in silence.
"Lieutenant, come in. Do you read?" The tone sharpened.
Still nothing.
"Smoker, respond." A third attempt—now tinged with suspicion and rising tension.
Then the line cut.
Echo's gut twisted. He cursed under his breath.
They're coming.
And he was still tethered to the terminal, mid-purge. Locked in place, exposed, and vulnerable.
He hit his comm.
"Kix, come in."
Crackling blaster fire roared on the other end before the medic's voice responded—gritty and out of breath.
"What's the problem? I'm kinda in the middle of a dance with three shock troopers!"
"I need a distraction. Now," Echo snapped, urgency bleeding through his otherwise controlled tone.
A pause. Then—Kix's voice returned, calm and deadly focused:
"Copy that. Get ready."
Echo glanced at the purge progress.
58%... 62%...
Hold together just a little longer, he thought, hand hovering near his detonator.
---
"Copy that. Get ready," Kix said, ending the transmission with a sharp flick of his wrist. The whine of speeder engines roared behind him—three Coruscant shock troopers giving chase through the packed industrial streets, their blasters spitting red bolts that sizzled past him.
But Kix wasn't just any clone trooper.
He was enhanced—cybernetic reflexes, split-second instincts, and nerves of durasteel. This wasn't a chase. It was a game. And the hunter was about to become the trap.
As the troopers closed in, Kix slammed on the brakes with a sudden, jarring pull—his speeder screeching and dipping nearly vertical as it slowed to a crawl.
"Kriff!" one of the troopers shouted, yanking back on his controls. Too late. One speeder swerved wildly, lost control, and smashed into a durasteel lamp post, the rider flung like a ragdoll into the street.
Kix spun his speeder in a perfect drift, now facing the two stunned pursuers head-on. His blaster was already drawn.
Two quick, calculated shots—pew, pew—struck home. The impact sent the remaining troopers flying from their bikes, armor clattering across the duracrete.
Smoke rose from the wreckage. Civilians screamed and ducked as chaos erupted around them.
Kix revved his engine once more, eyes locked on the Greywire building in the distance.
---
"Smoker, respond." The shock trooper captain's voice was firm, edged with rising irritation. Silence.
He clenched his jaw. "You two, with me. Squad B, hold this position and secure the perimeter. No more surprises." His tone cut like a vibroblade.
One of their BARC speeders had just been jacked in broad daylight, and now his lieutenant had gone dark. Someone was playing games—and he didn't like being the fool.
The captain and his men pushed through the cordoned-off storefront, boots crunching over broken glass and loose wiring.
They moved swiftly through the backroom and entered the lift descending to the underground level.
As the doors slid open with a hiss, a soft metallic clink echoed down the corridor.
His eyes dropped—a grenade.
"Kriff!" he barked, throwing himself back into the lift, narrowly diving behind cover. The device burst in a crackling arc of blue energy—BZZZZT!—flooding the hallway with electric discharge.
His men weren't so lucky. They collapsed to the ground, armor twitching, bodies stunned.
"Squad B, get down here—now!" he snapped into his comlink, eyes darting, pulse racing. But before a reply could come, a sudden crash thundered from the upper level. Screams. Blaster fire. Then… silence.
"Squad B, report! What the hell's going on up there?" he demanded, voice laced with urgency.
No answer.
The lift doors slid open again. A hooded figure stood before him, shadowed and still.
The captain raised his blaster and fired. The figure moved like smoke, deflecting, evading. But before he could fire again—
"Don't move."
A cold, mechanical voice whispered from behind, and he felt the unmistakable press of a blaster against his spine.
"Kriff." The curse barely escaped his lips before a searing jolt of electricity surged through him.
Everything went black.
Kix watched as the last of the troopers crumpled to the floor. Echo stepped back, calmly holstering his weapon.
"Is it done?" Kix asked, his voice low.
"Yeah. Come on—help me move the bodies," Echo replied without hesitation.
Together, they hauled the unconscious troopers from the underground lab, stuffing them into a large cargo crate.
Emerging onto the ground floor, they were greeted by the chaotic aftermath—a demolished BARC speeder parked dead center in the shop, a gaping, smoldering hole torn through the storefront.
Beneath the wreckage lay another trooper, motionless. Scattered around him were the rest of B Squad, unconscious or worse.
"Quite the entrance," Echo muttered, surveying the destruction with a mix of grim humor and urgency.
They worked fast, tossing the limp bodies into the crate. No time for elegance—only efficiency.
"Let's move," Echo ordered.
Kix nodded. In the distance, the wail of sirens grew louder—civil enforcement was closing in.
They slipped into the crowd outside, faces shrouded by hoods, vanishing into the sea of people.
Echo pressed a detonator.
—BOOM!
The store exploded behind them. Flames roared from the building like a dragon's breath, belching through the windows and blasting out the entrance in a fiery wave.
The shockwave threw reinforcements to the ground. Civilians screamed, scattering like frightened birds, while a few bold onlookers froze, watching in stunned awe.
Echo and Kix didn't flinch. From the edge of the chaos, they stood still, watching. Without a word, they turned and disappeared into the city's underbelly.
---
Level 1313. Second Floor, Abandoned Mechanical Shop.
"Fives, the job's done. Every trace of data has been wiped," Echo's voice crackled over the commlink.
"Good work. Return to base," Fives replied, cutting the transmission.
No sooner had the words left his lips than a crimson light pulsed across his wrist display—security breach.
Instinct surged. Fives drew his DC-17 hand blaster in a fluid motion, pivoting toward the staircase. He moved with precision, holding the high ground, senses sharpened.
Then—
Crash!
A burst of noise from below. Grunts. Metal on metal. The sound of a struggle cut short.
Fives advanced down the stairs with caution, clearing each corner with swift, practiced sweeps. At the base, his gaze landed on the source of the commotion.
A figure clad in sleek, black Phase II armor—an ISB enforcer—was suspended upside-down, one boot ensnared in a web of retractable durasteel cables dangling from the ceiling like a spider's trap.
The trooper's visor met Fives', and in that instant, his pain and panic hardened into grim resolve. He reached for his sidearm.
But Fives was faster.
A single, precise shot disarmed the agent, blasting the blaster clean from his grasp before he could fire.
The weapon clattered uselessly to the floor.
Fives fired a stun blast, dropping the armored intruder with a convulsive jolt. With blaster still raised, he swept the room, eyes narrowing. Two of his perimeter traps had been expertly disabled—but the third had done its job.
He approached the suspended ISB trooper, cutting him down with a flick of his vibroblade. The agent crumpled to the ground with a heavy thump. Fives stared at the motionless body, heart rate steady, but his thoughts racing.
This wasn't random.
The ISB didn't send agents unless someone powerful wanted answers. That meant one thing—he was on Palpatine's radar.
As he reached down to haul the operative's limp form up by the armor plating, an eerie chill skated down his spine. The fine hairs on the back of his neck stood at attention—a shadow of death was near.
Instinct kicked in.
Without hesitation, Fives spun on his heel, yanking the ISB trooper into position just in time—
Zzzap! Zzzap!
Smoke curled from the fresh wounds in the ISB agent's chest, the stench of scorched plastoid mingling with the tension thick in the air. Fives' jaw clenched, eyes narrowing as he scanned the shadows.
From the doorway, a slow, deliberate clap echoed.
"Impressive, clone..." a gravelly voice drawled as a figure emerged from the haze. The silhouette resolved into a tall, blue-skinned Duros with burning crimson eyes and a wide-brimmed hat casting a shadow over his cold expression.
"But not impressive enough."
Fives shifted his stance, blaster raised with deadly precision. His breath came steady, his mind already racing through tactics and probabilities.
"Cad Bane," he growled, voice low and taut with recognition.