BB Chuck Vs The Third Annual Verpine Asteroid Race

[MikDaTv]

The Johnny 5 touched down inside the cheapest hanger deck he could find on Nickel One, the capitol asteroid in the Roche system. It was a vacuum hanger so he had to wait for the Verpine to activate the magnetic field and re-pressurize the room.

While he waited, he decided this would be a good time to test out his latest addition to the ship. He reached up to the overhead console and flipped a switch that he'd added not 3 hours ago. There was a whirring from a tiny motor located on the port side of the cockpit and a squeaking noise as a pulley rotated.

Hutch turned around and waited. Sure enough, a little basket on a pulley zoomed down the corridor along the wire stretched up near the ceiling. The basket came to a stop just behind the couch and hutch reached into it and pulled out a hot dog. "Awesome." he said and took a bite of it. he flipped the switch the other way and the basket zoomed back to the galley. "Thanks Chuck!" He yelled back into the ship.

[MikDaTv]

Hutch got out of the small shower in his cabin on the Johnny 5 and toweled off. The towel smelled a little moldy, which it probably was. Hutch wasn't very good at the whole house keeping thing. He tossed the towel into a trash receptacle. He'd just buy a new one after the race with his winnings.

He got dressed quickly and headed to the lounge where BB Chuck was busy playing the computer at Quadrant. He'd been playing since they'd left and hadn't won a single game. Now he seemed to be breaking even with the computer. Hutch placed a hand over Chucks shoulder and glanced at the game in progress. "See Bee, your not just a simple loader droid. Your bettering yourself all the time... TIE fighter to B6."

Hutch left him and headed to the cockpit. He picked up the datapad Elizabeth Sweetwater had given him on the race along the way and started to skim through it. He skipped over the rules, since he was probably not going to obey them anyway and went right to his competition.

There were 7 other pilots entered in the race. The pilot for Black Sun would prove to be the toughest to beat. Of the 8 racers, the Black sun pilot was the only droid. Oomnione was a heavily modified OOM series pilot battle droid. But it wasn't your average B1 battle droid at the helm. The droid had two droid brains worth of pilot programming in it. Multiple species with multiple programming. The fact that the droid could operate at all with all that conflicting programming was amazing. It was also the reason why the droid was independent and worked for Black Sun as a smuggler and blockade runner.

His ship was equally as impressive. It was a JumpMaster 5000 but also with heavy modifications. It's port side had two additional turbine thrusters attached and her main engines were rigged to run off raw power from the power generators. it created dangerous temperatures and levels of radiation within the ship but since the pilot was a droid that did not matter. Omnione could perform maneuvers no human could do and operate even after his ship has lost life support and pressure. He would be a challenging opponent.

which is why Hutch planned on sabotaging his ship long before the race ever started.

[MikDaTv]

Hutch walked down the boarding ramp of the Johnny 5. The hanger was all to himself and he wanted to see about getting some work done on it's exterior. Instead of his usual dull gray shirt and green jacket, today he decided to brighten up the dull and lifeless hanger deck by wearing a bright red Hawaiian shirt with bright blue flower prints all over it.

A Verpine wearing a orange jumpsuit and heavy laden tool belt approached. "Sir, we've been assigned to your ship. Anything that needs any work?"

Hutch looked at the mechanic, then back at the ship, and then back at the mechanic and smiled. "Orange paint. We're going to need a lot of orange paint."

[MikDaTv]

Hutch pulled the last bit of sticky paper way from the front viewport and tossed it to the hanger deck below. Hutch stood up on the nose of the cockpit and looked at the hull of his ship with satisfaction. "Awesome."

He climbed down the ladder to the deck where the verpine mechanic and his team were working. In the 46 hours they'd been working on and off between sleep and eating they'd gotten a lot done. The ship was now painted a bright orange from stem to stern. If he ever got in an accident, emergency services would be able to spot him in orbit with their eyes alone.

The other Verpines had been doing standard maintenance on everything, making sure the ship was running as smooth as factory new. While Hutch had been painting he'd been trying to think of a way to sabotage the other racers in the contest.

As he replaced the paint sprayer an idea struck him that was as devious as it was cunning. He tapped the Verpine on the shoulder and raised a finger asking a question. "Question, do you have that kind of paint that changes colors under certain kinds of radiation?"

The Verpine shrugged. "I can show you to the store room. i'm pretty sure we have several different kinds."

"Sweet, lead the way."

[MikDaTv]

Hutch marched out of the restricted zone as stealthily as he could. Security in the Racing hangers was moderate at best. Apparently the Verpine expected the racers to be fair and honest. Most of them probably were, but Hutch had no intention of being either fair or honest.

When Oomnione unplugged himself from his recharge cycle he'd find his ship in disarray. He did the best job he could t making it look like he'd tried to keep the ship from ever taking off during the race. Cut power cables and hydrolic lines. external parts removed and his crown jewel, the front viewport had been completely painted over with the same orange paint that the Johnny 5 was now decorated with.

He'd made sure to stay away from doing anything to the ship interior. he could have entered into the ship easily, in fact, he did. Picking locks, even electronic ones, was one of his specialties, but he didn't want Oomnione to think he had. The real sabotage work had been on the interior of the ship. It was subtle and sneaky and something even the droid would find difficulty contending with.

The rest of the sbatage had been enough that a biological pilot wouldn't be able to repair it before the race but Oomnione was a droid and could easily finish it. The orange paint would clue him as to who it was that did the sabatage and he would then therefore think of Hutch as an inferior pilot who requires cheats to win.

Well, he was right. Hutch had no illusions that the droid pilot could out fly him so Hutch wasn't going to give him the change. And if it was true that the Droid did have a personality then perhaps it also had an ego which Hutch could exploit.

[MikDaTv]

The Johnny 5 sat on it's place at the starting line. Between the two starting posts with the particle shield up in front of his nose. The other racers were on his starboard side along the line. He was the furthest ship on the left waiting for the start of the race.

On the far right was Oomnione in his ship, the Fell Swoop. There was still bits of orange paint around the viewports but it had been scraped off so the droid could see. The fact that he even got it out of the hanger bay was evidence that at least most of the rest of the damage that Hutch had done the night before had been fixed as well.

Hutch switched over to the private racing frequency. "Hey Oomni, i heard you had some problems last night. surprised to see you on the line."

There was a long pause before the droid replied. His synthesized voice had that familiar B1 battle droid sound to it. "I know your responsible Mr. Hutch."

Hutch smiled. "i dont know what your talking about Oomni. and it's not Mr. Hutch. Mr. Hutch was my father. I'm just Hutch."

If a droid could sound angry, it was in Oomnione's voice in his response. "You clearly don't know who your dealing with Hutch. I repaired all your damage and now i'll beat you in this little contest."

"Sure Oomnione, sure. We'll see about that."

[MikDaTv]

The starting buzzer sounded over the Johnny 5's com board and the particle shield across the starting line disappeared. Hutch slammed the throttles forward and pulled hard on the yolk to the right. The Johnny 5 pulled hard to starboard across the paths of the other racers, cutting them off as they tried to get up to speed.

Without slowing down Jor turned the yolk left and the Johnny 5 reversed it's turn. Her engine block nearly scraped across the bow of some of the other ships as the ship straitened out and jetted towards the first marker.

on the far right of the starting line, Oomnione was far enough away that Jor's cuttoff maneuver didn't bother him to much and he fell into second place quickly as the other racers had to quickly adjust their coarse sharply to avoid hitting Hutch.

Hutch pushed the throttles forward the rest of the way and pushed the Johnny 5 to her limits. He'd never opened her up all the way before and engine temp was quickly rising.

Fell Swoop pulled up along side the Johnny 5 very closely turned on it's port side so Oomnione could look up through his canopy at Hutch. Hutch waved and smiled and put the Johnny 5 into a spin.

The Fell Swoop pulled ahead of him accelerating slightly faster then the Johnny 5. The first marker approached rapidly. The glowing red buoy blinked slowly, beckoning the racers towards it.

The Fell Swoop passed the first marker and pulled a sharp port turn towards the next marker. Like most droid pilots Hutch had heard of, Oomnione had removed the inertial compensator, or used a severely dialed down one to save on additional energy that can be used in the engines. The Fell Swoop's turn continued turning, long after it should have straitened out on it's new coarse. Hutch passed it after turning at the first marker himself. Oomnione in his ship just kept up his turn, making almost a complete circle.

The other racers pulled up and passed him as well. Oomnione completed 2 full circles before gaining control of his ship and righting it. he rejoined the race and quickly gained on the racers in the rear.

Hutch's com blinked and he opened the channel. Oomnione's voice came over the ships speakers. "Clever, i had not anticipated such a low tech sabotage."

Jor laughed uproariously over the com. as part of his sabatage the night before, Hutch had taken a knife and worn through the straps on the Fell Swoops crash webbing where it attached within the folds of the pilot seat. When Oomnione had pulled his turn, the angular momentum, his mass, and the lack of intertial compensation had throwing the droid to the starboard. the Crash webbing snapped and the droid flew out of his seat and lost control of the ship causing it's strange circles after the first marker. "Honestly, i don't know what your talking about." Hutch said between laughs.

Hutch set coarse for the second marker. He got out of his seat and went over to the life support console and shut off the heaters in the cargo bays and shunted their power to the engines.

[MikDaTv]

The racers were nearing the first obstacle in the race. To test each ships defensive capabilities the race took them through a satellite field filled with defensive gunnery satellites. Each Satellite was armed with two laser cannons on individually mounted turrets. The object of the obstacle was to see how each racer could handle a dangerous combat situation and how well their ships could deal with the punishment.

The Fell Swoop had regained much of it's lead over the other Racers and was now right back on Hutch's tail. Hutch had done a good job so far of keeping himself in the way of the droid pilot to prevent him from passing but the Johnny 5's engines were screaming for a rest. He hadn't let up on the full throttle since the beginning of the race.

The satellite cloud loomed before them and Hutch decided now was the best time to give the ship a break. he pulled back the throttles a little and powered up the weapons. BB Chuck was in the lounge manning the makeshift controls they had rigged for the bottom turret. Hutch could fire the top turret but not control it.

The Johnny 5 and Fell Swoop entered the field at the same time and almost immediately started receiving damage. Laser blasts flew all around them striking the shields. Hutch channeled some energy from whatever auxiliary system he could and pumped it into the shields. Then he held down the button on his fire control and the top turret started cycling. Anything in front of the ship was under threat of getting hit and that seemed to keep Oomnione from getting in front of him.

[MikDaTv]

The shield control console sparked and fizzled as the Johnny 5 sustained 3 hits to her rear deflectors at once. Hutch spun the ship up onto her side and pulled back on the stick putting the freighter through an arc across the field that took him off coarse but put the strain on the dorsal shields rather then the rear shields.

Oomnione's voice came over the com in what Hutch could only assume was a mocking tone for a droid. "Perhaps you should have your shield looked at Hutch."

Hutch twirld the Johnny 5 and hauled the stick left and up to bring the ship back on coarse, spraying fire across a wide path which destroyed a satellite and put one into a spin which would make it impossible for it's guns to target anything with accuracy.

The end of the field was in sight so hutch threw the engines back into full throttle and channeled all the energy from the forward shields into them. The Johnny 5 blasted forward again and burst from the satellite field. Laser blasts panged against her rear shields and BB Chuck returned fire with the ventral turret.

Fell Swoop left the field at close to the same time and both ships started their slingshot maneuver around the sun. The race took them around the sun at close range to test each ships survivability. This leg of the race was clearly in Oomnione's favor since he could survive a lot more radiation then Hutch could. The Fell Swoop could get a lot closer to the sun for it's slingshot then Hutch could. But Hutch wasn't worried, he had an ace that was left to play.

[MikDaTv]

The Johnny 5 started it's slingshot maneuver around the sun in the closest orbit he could possibly get without risking radiation poisoning. His shields were actually flaring against the intense radiation put off by the celestial body which was a testament to it's power.

Oomnione on the other hand was several hundred kilometers closer to the sun then he wa . As a droid he could survive greater radiation and could cut closer to the sun, allowing for a tighter slingshot. However, unknown to Oomnione, Hutch had his ace left to play.

The Fell Swoop started to pull ahead easily but then suddenly veered off coarse. Hutch kept his freighter on it's coarse but kept a close eye on the Fell Swoop but he couldn't keep the smile from his face. While he had done a good job of painting over the main viewport with orange paint, but the real act of sabotage was when he painted the inside of the viewport with clear paint. Except when that paint is exposed to intense ultraviolet light. Then it turned bright purple.

Oomnione had brought his ship so close to the sun that even whithout direct radiation, the ultraviolet light was great enough to trigger the change and all of a sudden he couldn't see.

This was Hutch's chance. He poured all the power he could muster into his engines including life support. He needed enough of a lead that he could make a nice distance between him and Oomnione before the droid managed to scrape the paint off enough that he could see.

[MikDaTv]

The Johnny 5 crossed the finish line with smoke pouring from it's engine block. BB Chuck was in the engine space with a fire extinguisher putting out electrical fires and Hutch wasn't sure if he could get the Life support system back online from the controls in the cockpit without some major work. But it seemed to be worth it.

The Johnny 5 was first. It finished the race with the lowest time, he got the prize money, the Exchange would be very happy with him, he defaced a Black Sun Pilot and earned himself some serious bragging rights. He needed some time for some repairs and then it was back to Zeltros to let the creepy boss lady know how awesome he was.