Chapter 31

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D'QAR. RESISTANCE AIRFILED.

Destin entered The Nighthawk and found Neema and Bozin already in the cockpit, readying the ship for takeoff. He set his knapsack on the bolted sofa in the shared living quarters and checked his person. His had restocked his emergency materials within the pouches of his utility belt and had strapped a blaster he received from the Resistance armory - and of course, he had his lightsaber concealed, just in case. He stepped through the corridor leading to the cockpit and watched as Neema and Bozin pressed numerous buttons and switches. Outside, through the dash window, he could see the engines of the many X-Wings of the Resistance spark to life. A voice chimed over The Nighthawk's raido.

"All squads! You have clearance for take-off. I repeat. You have clearance for take-off!" the voice said. 

All the leaders of the squads - red squad, blue squad, and black squad consecutively  - responded in turn, signaling their take offs, and suddenly Destin got a turn in his stomach. He had never been part of an operation like this before. Certainly, he had dances with death before, but nothing to this scale - not with so much at stake. Not just for the Resistance, but for him as well. This was one giant leap towards finding out what happened to his sister, and how he needed to succeed. If he failed at finding the encryption key they needed to decrypt the holocron's files, stars knew if he'd ever find a lead like this again. 

Neema radioed in to flight control. "This is The Nighthawk. Lifting off." She turned to Bozin. "Ready?" she asked.

"You mean ready to fly into a giant First Order death planet, sneak past an entire army of Stormtroopers, and break into their secret and highly classified data houses?" Bozin responded sarcastically. "Yeah, sure. What could go wrong?"

"Just another day on The Nighthawk," Destin quiped.

They all laughed, shaking off Destin's nerves just a little bit. Neema and Bozin brought The Nighthawk to life and Destin could feel the hull shake as the ship's engines roared.  It rose from the ground and hovered, following the other X-Wing squadrons, leaving the landing bay of Resistance HQ. They flew in formation up towards the sky, eventually breaking through the atmosphere of the planet. Once in open space, the order was by given by Black Leader and all the ships jumped to light speed. There was no turning back now. 

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