Story HourPost your ongoing tales from your campaigns, and read those from others for inspiration. Lots of other RPG boards post "Story Hours", but this is where it started!
“Yes, its locked,” Akan growled over his shoulder, “If it wasn’t, it’d be open and we wouldn’t still be standing here!”
They had left the large hangar and followed a long corridor to a sealed door. Well sealed. Shadow said they were going the right direction, saying she could smell the two officers who had gotten away. Akan, not in the mood to start another argument, simply took her word on it and put his attention to the door. It had been five minutes of attempting to open the door the conventional way before he cursed and got his lightsaber out.
As he cut through the door, Akan noticed that Shadow was looking at him as if he were some idiotic fool. He glared at her for a moment and went back to ‘opening’ the door. After cutting a box shaped hole, he kicked it in and saw that the next room actually looked to be more than a junk pile. There were active computer consoles all along the walls and a few chairs scattered around a small holoscreen on the opposite wall. However, the room was empty.
Lightsaber still in hand and activated, Akan carefully stepped into the room. Of course, Shadow had already slipped through before him. He was starting to get used to that by now, and she had started moving towards one of the other two doors. Looking to a console, Akan raised an eyebrow and waived for Shadow to hold on. He examined then deactivated his lightsaber and grabbed a spare datapad that was off on the side. Sliding it into the console, he copied all of the files onto the datapad. Logs mostly, but some of it was about whatever the facility was working on.
Satisfied now, he pocketed the datapad and walked over to Shadow, who was waiting with her arms folded across her chest. Her tail stopped swishing across the ground and then, without a word, she turned to he door. Akan was behind her this time, and when she opened the door he was glad for it. It slid open and Shadow was left face to face with the white helmet of a stormtrooper. Both of them stood still in a moment of shock, but Shadow reacted first. Her vibroblade still out, she thrust it up into the trooper’s side, where the armor didn’t cover, and then punched him hard so he fell onto his back. Behind him in the small were two other troopers who were scrambling for their weapons. The first had no luck, as Shadow pounced him and her vibroblade did its work silently. The second managed to get his drawn before Akan put a blaster bolt into his helmet. He collapsed against the wall and knocked a small desk over in the process.
Akan then stepped into the room properly, seeing that off to the far end were three barred doors. He nodded to Shadow, who got the idea and stepped over to them. As he caught up, he managed to notice that the stormtrooper Shadow had pounced had long claw marks across his chest plate...could she have? At this point, Akan wasn’t about to throw the concept out the window. Attention back on the moment, he walked straight over to the door that Shadow was flanking. Instead of doing the same, he just kicked it hard, bending the metal inwards and proving that it was on some kind of hinges. The second time he kicked it, the door went down, and Akan found himself looking at a small storage room with boxes of food and rations. But why station three troopers to guard rations? They weren’t anywhere near that good tasting...
“Hello?!” ah, that answered that. At least one of the storage closets was being used as a makeshift cell mostly likely. Akan then walked over to where he’d heard the voice...female, human most likely. The third door down. He then opened it to a punch in the chest.
Shadow started diving forward, assuming a threat, but Akan’s arm was extended to hold her back. He had been right. It was a woman...a woman with a strong right arm from the feel of it. She had shoulder length blonde hair and two bright blue eyes. She wore a simple brown tunic with green piping and the New Republic insignia on the shoulders. One of the scientists. Noticing he wasn’t in any Imperial uniform, she smiled apologetically, “Sorry about that.”
Akan managed to return the smile, holding his chest slightly, “Oh, don’t worry about it...I get that all the time. You’re one of the scientists?”
She nodded, looking over his shoulder to Shadow, who was tilting her head around and looking even more feline than usual with the way her neck bent. The scientist’s attention then turned back to Akan, and she extended a hand, “Um...yes, yes. Jen Zaarin.”
“Akan Tavos,” he said shaking her hand, he then nodded over his shoulder, “This is Shadow. We were here to find out what happened to you scientists...”
Zaarin smiled again and seemed to lose a large amount of tension, “You’re with the New Republic, then?”
A short flash of something passed across Akan’s face. He’d never been asked that before and somehow it...hurt. As quickly as it had come, it was gone, and he said distantly, “When they pay enough. Look, we’re not here to slaughter Imperials...are there any other scientists left in here?”
“Not that I know of,” Jen said, having caught his expression but ignoring it for the moment, “The rest of them got out on our shuttle or fled into the forest.”
“Then we can leave now,” Akan said, turning the other direction and starting to leave without another word. Shadow waited for Zaarin to move onward, and fell into step behind the woman. Forget the other officers, they now had an Imperial officer(or would have) and one of the scientists. That was enough to find out what happened and get the money. No more need for killing. When they reached the large room again, Akan picked up the still unconscious officer and started on their way out, Shadow leading the way just in case.
“We’re about to head up,” Akan called into the comm as they looked outside, noting that the Y-Wing was untouched and the area around it looked empty enough.
Ansion’s voice replied over the comm, “Division Two and Four are already heading to the Claw. One’s about to lift off and we’re nearly to our ship. They’re up there getting ready for hyperspace as soon as we’re all in. At least an Star Destroyer’s worth of ground troops here. They’re looking for something and we’re just in the way.”
Akan took another careful look across the tree line beyond the Y-Wing, then behind him to Zaarin. She was watching Shadow, who knelt on the other side of the entrance and looked like a predator just ready to pounce. Zaarin caught Akan’s eye and he just shrugged, then tapped the comm again, “We’ve got one of their officers. Hopefully can figure out what they’re so crazy about. Then get paid...” he trailed off a moment, glancing to Jen and lowering his voice, “This is more than I bargained for, anyway.”
“Agreed,” Ansion responded a few moments later, “Get back to the ship and we’ll figure things out from there.”
The comm clicked on the other end, and Akan turned to the others, “Looks clear to me. Probably should get out of here before any more Imperials arrive.”
Shadow simply nodded and picked up the officer, who she’d been handed and had done much better carrying him anyway. It seemed like no matter what, she was better than Akan was. As a Jedi, he knew this was stupid and everyone had their own strengths...but something about it still bothered him. Shaking off the feeling he turned back to Zaarin, who nodded as he got up and followed suit.
Blaster ready, Akan carefully moved to the Y-Wing. Nothing shot at him...good. Heading to the underside of the cockpit, he flipped a switch that opened up the very small cargo compartment. Being part of the cockpit, it had minimal life support systems for some reason. Convenient for moments like this. Shadow was behind him, and stuffed the body of the officer into the compartment before it was closed. Not only would he wake up with a horrible migraine, but his neck was going to ache too.
Climbing up onto the nose of the ship, he opened the canopy and looked back to Shadow and Zaarin. Someone was going to be riding this a friend...Akan began to voice this, but Shadow...changed. It was as disturbing as before, but somehow he almost expected it. Now, on the ground in front of the Y-Wing where she had stood, there was a small creature that looked much like she had been before. Feline...much like a Corellian sand panther, but with a mane along its back to the tail. Except this time she was smaller. Almost the right size to rest on his shoulder.
Zaarin stared in amazement and Akan managed a shrug, “Pick her up and hand her to me. Looks like you ride in the back with...” he waved his hand vaguely to what he was pretty sure was Shadow. Before Jen had the chance to actually pick the feline up, Shadow bent back and hopped up onto the Y-Wing with one leap. Impressive.
She then padded over and hopped into the gunner’s seat, waiting with a very impatient look on her ‘face’. Akan shrugged to Zaarin, and knelt down a little, extending his arm down to help her up. She took his hand and he managed to get her up onto the nose. Quietly, he said, “Look, I don’t know either. Lets just get out of here first, hm?”
Slowly, Jen nodded and climbed into the rear-facing gunner’s seat with Shadow sitting in her lap. Akan started to turn to get into the pilot’s chair but something...a quick flash shot through his mind. A second later he heard the sound of a blaster firing....far off, only one shot. With the warning from the Force, he was already moving to his left, rolling off to the side and nearly off the Y-Wing. But no...somehow the Force was wrong. He dove...into the shot, which caught him hard in the right shoulder. The pain pinned him to the metal plate next to the canopy, and as he could smell the charred flesh from the shot only one thought ran through his mind. How could that have hit him? It wasn’t aimed at him...but where he dodged to. That didn’t make sense...
But this wasn’t the time to lay still. Someone was out there that was most likely the best shot in the galaxy. And the canopy was open..leaving Zaarin and Shadow in the open. Akan’s mind forced his eyes to open and as he turned his head, he saw a red flash that coincided with the sound of the blaster shot again. Off in the trees...just to the east of the installation. This time when he rolled to the front of the nose, with the canopy behind him and providing at least minimal cover, the blaster shot hit the Y-Wing where he had been lying. Great. Not waiting for another shot, he got to his knees and climbed over the fixed part of the canopy into the pilot’s chair, “The second the power’s up fire the ion cannons into the trees back behind us!” he growled painfully, “It’ll at least scare him off!”
Zaarin was currently in the process of holding Shadow down, who was madly trying to get out and most likely go kill the shooter. No time for that, at least Zaarin understood. The first thing he did as the Y-Wing warmed up was to close the canopy. It would only provide protection for one or two shots, but it was more than nothing. More shots started ringing out at them. No longer just single...and Akan glanced to the tree line to see stormtroopers coming out of nearly everywhere. Ansion wasn’t kidding about there being a Star Destroyer’s worth on the planet...
With the Y-Wing warmed up, he immediately cut on the repulsorlifts and started getting them airborne. The ion cannon wasn’t firing...why?
“I said shoot, dammit!” Akan growled through gritted teeth as he tried to ignore the pain in his right arm. That was no easy task, of course.
Zaarin’s voice sounded panicked when she cried back to him, “I don’t know how! I don’t fly! I’m a scientist!”
“Typical!” he then cursed to himself and fired the main cannons at the trees as they got over them. Two came toppling down, but Akan didn’t give time to see the effects of the shots beyond that. They were still being shot at, and though the Y-Wing had strong armor when compared to personal weapons, lucky shots were still to be worried about. Looking across the blue sky of the planet, Akan caught sight of two Imperial Sentinel-class Landing Shuttles. One was still on the ground, but the other was just pulling out of the trees about ten or so kilometers out. At the same time, up in orbit, he could see the underbelly of a Star Destroyer. Great.
“Claw, we’re just on our way up,” he called into the comm channel that was disturbingly silent, “Can you hold on for just a few more minutes?”
There was a long pause before he heard the voice of one of the members of the Claw’s bridge crew, “Div Three just got in and we’re trying to outrun that Star Destroyer. Get up here before they get to us or meet us at these coords.”
A line of hyperspace coordinates were transmitted to him, and he kept them on the screen despite not planning on using them. Cutting the sublight engines on, the Y-Wing was sent shooting off into the atmosphere. Sensors showed that the Sentinel shuttle was following. With its weapons compliment, if it got in range they were most likely going to end up as more wreckage for the orbit of Endor. Then something started beeping.
“What’s that?!” Zaarin called out, trying to look around to see.
Akan cut off the alarm and watched the blue fade into the blackness of space. Not very far to the starboard side of the Y-Wing was the Star Destroyer...closing fast. Off to the port side, there was a small silhouette that could only be the Claw pulling away from the planet. But those weren’t the reason for the alarms, “TIEs on their way. Interceptors. Fast...we can’t outrun them,” he activated the comm, “Claw, get out of here. We’ll meet you at the destination.”
“Affirmative,” replied the same voice as before, “Good luck.”
“You, too,” Akan cut off the comm and put the engines to full. Just had to get out of the planet’s gravity well and then make a quick jump before going to the actual coordinates, “Zaarin, can you plot a hyperspace course to some system close?”
“Um...yes,” she sounded a bit unsure, but the ‘yes’ was nice.
“Do it fast, and tell me the second its done,” he was speaking in short, quick tones that were in no way friendly. This wasn’t the time to think about anything but hopeful survival. At least he’d never had to ask for an interesting life. Instead, he sometimes just wanted a day where nothing at all happened. The Force at least owed him that much.
Apparently, the Force didn’t agree. Another beeping sound started and Akan cursed as he tried to bring the fighter into enough turns so that whoever was currently trying to lock on(most likely the Sentinel which was still back behind him) would at least have some trouble. Y-Wings were not meant for speed, maneuvering, or anything really beyond bombing, assault, and support. Slow and bulky...and old.
Suddenly the cockpit was going crazy with alarms. Missile fired...behind them. The sentinel. Jen let out a yelp(as she could most likely see it coming towards them), and Akan started pulling the Y-Wing into maneuvers it was never meant to handle. It growled an argument but managed the corkscrew dive anyway, the concussion missile followed suit as best it could, but when Akan cut the thrusts off completely and pulled up just a few degrees, he held his breath. Not a second later, he watched the red missile shoot past, only a few meters from impacting the craft.
Letting out a sigh of relief, he put the engines back to full and diverted as much of the weapon’s power to the engines to get even more out of them. He gave one quick glance over his shoulder to Zaarin, “How’s it coming?!”
“...its ready!” She said almost too loudly. Good. The Interceptors were just reaching firing range, and the alarms were going crazy as multiple ships began firing on them. Not taking prisoners, obviously.
“Hold on and pray!” Akan called out, angling the ship in the correct direction and pulled the hyperspace levers. The lines of the stars pulled back slowly, so slowly that Akan was sure that they’d get hit just as they were leaving. But then, they shot forward and a tunnel of blue surrounded the cockpit of the ship. Allowing himself another sigh, Akan slumped back into the seat and said quietly, “You had better be worth all this trouble, Zaarin.”
It was a two minute jump to the middle of no where. Nothing followed them, and so they were soon off on their way to meet up with the Claw. It would be an hour and a half stuck in the confines of the cockpit. Shadow had fallen asleep in Jen’s lap, and Akan had all but forgotten about the officer stuck in the cargo hold. He had closed his eyes and just rested for what seemed like most of the flight, but he heard Jen say...something. Eyes opened again with a sigh, he glanced at the chrono on the HUD. Still forty minutes left...
“What did you say?” Akan asked over his shoulder in a strangely quiet voice. With the only noise being the hum of the hyperdrive, it was louder than even he’d expected.
He heard Jen shifting slightly, “You’re a Jedi?”
Ah...small talk. At least it would pass time, “I try.”
“Then you...fought against the Empire?” she was referring to the Galactic Civil War, no doubt.
Memories slipped back through his protected mind...short flashes of flying his X-Wing. Mission briefings...infiltrating an Imperial base...somehow, they didn’t hurt like he’d worried. But perhaps that was because of the absence of the most painful ones. Slowly, he nodded, “A lifetime ago.”
There was a long pause as she seemed to think about what else to say. After a moment, he noticed another sound...quiet, but constant. Purring. He tried to look over his shoulder but couldn’t see. Zaarin caught onto what he was doing, “Do you know what she is?”
Akan shrugged, then remembered she couldn’t see that, “No. I just met her a few minutes before heading down to the planet.”
“Oh...” Jen looked out at the tunnel of hyperspace that was cascading away from her, “You said you were sent to find out what happened?”
“Don’t...not now,” Akan closed his eyes again, “Save it for Ansion. He knows the details...I just do the covert work. Not too well, obviously.”
She laughed slightly at that, and somehow that surprised him. He hadn’t meant that as a joke. Her tone changed to that of curiosity, “You talk like you’re an old man, you know that?”
Again, he shrugged. This time, though, he grinned at the natural reaction. He glanced up and out of the canopy through the fringe of his dark brown hair and opened his eyes, “Sometimes people grow up too soon.”
He’d just said that. He didn’t even understand it, or realize the truth of it. It just...came out. Jen had raised an eyebrow at that, her hand that was scratching at the feline’s ear stopped for just a moment, which got a quiet ‘rowr’ out of the sleeping creature, “How’s the wound?”
“It will heal,” Akan looked back down and to the deep black mark on his right shoulder. He could move the arm, but it hurt far too much to be worth it. The shot had hit hard, but something was still wrong. It should have killed him where it hit. Not just burned and scarred.
Another long silence grew out of his thoughts. The purring noise had started up again, and Akan couldn’t help but grin very slightly at that. Shadow was a strange creature...silent and business minded from what he could figure, but then when she was like that. So much like a child. Ansion had been right...despite how much better at everything she seemed to be, Shadow’s skills complimented Akan’s very well. Suddenly he heard a noise...clicking. Something opened.
There was a small compartment in the back section that used to hold personal belongings...”Who’s this?” Jen’s voice asked. That compartment was empty last he remembered. Maybe someone else put something in there. It was technically his Y-Wing, but the others used it from time to time.
“Who’s what?” Akan asked, looking over his shoulder to see what she was talking about.
Jen had moved some but he still couldn’t get around to see it, and she hadn’t handed it to him, “The girl in this holo. The other actually looks like you...younger though.”
“What are you...” he trailed off as he managed to catch a glimpse of the small holo in her hand. At once he knew it, and he felt a deep pain returning. Something that had stayed hidden for so long that it had only gotten worse, never being given a chance to heal. Tears welled up in his eyes but Akan fought them back. It was himself...Raan...and Mare. Both wore their flight suits and it looked like they were about to leave. There was a distracted smile on his face, and Mare had almost the same look. Three years ago...
His mouth opened to say something, but no words came out, only a croaked noise. He took in a deep breath and tried again, barely managing the words, “A friend...”
Not any kind of fool, Jen noticed the reaction the holo had caused. She quickly put it down, and asked in a careful voice, “What’s wrong?”
Memories slowly came back. Part of it was ironic to him...the void within him returned within the void of hyperspace. He closed his eyes and rested his face in one and, “She...I...she died.”
There was a long silence, and he heard Jen shift again, hearing her voice closer to the seat now, “I’m sorry...”
“Don’t apologize,” Akan’s voice was strangely harsh, not at all comforting coming from one who was supposed to be a Jedi.
“How...long ago?” Jen asked, seemingly choosing her words carefully. Part of him wondered if she was just prying, but Akan was smart enough to know she was trying to help. Why...he didn’t know. But somehow it felt good to at least speak of it.
He reached a hand back over his shoulder, open and waiting for her to hand the holo to him, “Three years.”
Jen placed the holo in his hand and he pulled it back to look at it. He was so young then...a lifetime ago was right. That boy in the holo was no longer alive. He’d been replaced by someone who ran the risk of destroying himself even more. A Jedi with such deep pain was dangerous. To himself more than anything. Jen’s voice interrupted his thoughts, “I didn’t know they allowed people so young to be pilots...”
“They were desperate,” Akan said, not able to fight back the grin that the statement had always gotten to his face, “And we...I was good enough that age didn’t matter.”
“There are other things in here...” Jen’s voice was accompanied by her rummaging. Somehow, this didn’t bother Akan. It should...she was going through his memories as it were. Painful memories, at that...ones that he had gone through great lengths to forget. Maybe time had healed them more than he’d thought...no. No. Nothing could heal it.
“The...the datapad is her diary,” Akan said very quietly, a hand reaching up to touch the holo gently, “The other is a holo from her home. After...,” something in him couldn’t let him say the words that he knew were true. So instead, he just continued on anyway, “After, I held onto her things. It was all she had...and they would have just gotten rid of it.”
He reached back over again, handing Jen the holo of the two young pilots. She took the holo, but her hand held his for a long moment. It was...strange. Gently, she squeezed his hand, “I lost all of my family and friends on Alderaan. I know how you feel.”
A sudden emotion, so close to rage it was almost tangible welled up within Akan. He jerked his hand away and looked to the chrono. It had reached zero. They were there. He reached for the hyperdrive switch, and pulled them back. They reverted back to realspace, and there sat the Claw, in he middle of the blackness of no where.
“You have no idea,” Akan said low and dangerously, “The only way you could know how I feel is if you fired that blast that destroyed the planet.”
Akan didn’t speak anymore after that, and upon arriving on the Claw, he’d quickly left without even a word to Ansion. The Verpine greeted Jen with what was most likely his species’ equivalent of a smile, motioning towards the turbolift on the other end of the hangar, “If you wouldn’t mind coming this way...I wasn’t planning on any kind of debriefing, but I didn’t plan on being shot at. I assume you don’t mind me asking questions?”
Jen smiled and started towards the turbolift. It felt good to be out of the cramped cockpit of that Y-Wing, “Of course not.”
She gave one last glance back to Shadow, who was now in her humanoid form and pulling the unconscious Imperial Officer out of the cargo hold. Jen noticed that Shadow seemed to take a strange delight in the thud sound that the Officer made when he slammed into the deck below. Then, for a short moment, she looked off towards the far end towards the turbolift that Akan had left towards. Part of her wanted to talk with him more...but the way he sounded was enough to show it wasn’t a good idea.
Her attention soon turned back towards the moment at hand, and did her best to run through some old tension relief techniques she’d learned while younger. Before she knew it, Ansion had led her into the large meeting room of the ship, and it was strange how empty it looked with only two people in it.
The Verpine motioned to a chair and then to a set of drinks on the table, “Have a seat and a drink. Its not the best stuff in the galaxy, but we get a hold of what we can.”
“Thank you,” Jen nodded and took a glass, tasting the liquid carefully. It was strong...very strong. Probably some kind of Corellian Ale. Of course, the other scientists back at the facility kept things much more dangerous than that, so it didn’t phase her much.
Ansion had a seat across from her at the table and stretched just slightly, his long slender limbs moving awkwardly with the motion, “First, I’ll tell you why we appeared at such an out of the way planet as Endor. The New Republic contacted me a few standard days ago. They said that one of their small, but important science facilities had essentially disappeared. Comms didn’t only not reply, but nothing could be sent in to be recieved. Transmitters on devices shut down...etc etc. Apparently, the High Command was worried that the research you were doing would fall into Imperial hands. They didn’t say it directly, but I’ve worked with people long enough to learn to tell things like that. It took prying and lowering of my price, but I managed to get the information on what it was you were doing down there...” he paused a moment to give her a long look, “Now what I want to know from you is fairly simple. You may not even know it. But how is it that the Empire found out about your genetic work?”
Jen wasn’t very surprised that Ansion knew what they had been doing on the planet. He had said himself that he’d had to work to get it, and he was right about that. For the New Republic to give information to a mercenary, they must have trusted him. She then thought about his question, and shrugged, “I don’t know. The obvious answer is a spy...or someone in the facility itself. But I don’t know. My job isn’t to deal with things like that.”
“Well, we didn’t exactly expect our job to end up like it did,” Ansion said a bit cryptically, but he still had a generally positive tone, “We’re currently on our way to Coruscant. There we’ll drop you off and have a quick meeting with some of the higher ups...I think we’re entitled to some details on this one.”
Nodding, Jen smiled and said, “May I ask you a question...?”
“About Akan, I assume?” he was good. Of course, dealing with people as much as he did probably made that a necessity.
She nodded and sat back in the chair some, “You know about his...past yes?”
“I know a little,” the Verpine said, nodding slowly, “I found him when he was about eighteen. He’d been working with New Republic Spec Force on a joint operation with us. It was an search and destroy mission inside an Imperial base out on Duros. It was a disaster. We freed an Imperial prisoner who ended up being an Officer during the Civil War who’d been put there by some power hungry Moff after the Emperor was killed. The Officer thanked us by killing three of us...Akan tried to deal with him, but had as little luck as the rest of us. Somehow we got away...but that boy was never the same. He didn’t even remember his name after that...” Ansion shrugged, “I felt bad about it, and took him in. I managed to learn a lot from him in small bits. Things he claimed were dreams...too detailed, however. I’ve been looking for a way to help him out for a long while...it finally presented itself a couple of days ago.”
Jen thought on this, and then raised an eyebrow, “You’re talking about that...Shadow creature?”
“The New Republic Intelligence should get you on their side,” Ansion grinned as best a Verpine could, “Yes. She’s much like him. Except she found us. There’s something buried within her, too. Her old friend, a smuggler named Max. He used to work with us so I knew of her. After he died, I tracked her down and asked her to join up with us. She obviously had no where else to go, and joined up with us. Akan and Shadow...its strange, but they’ve got very similar histories. I’m hoping they’ll work out their pasts so that they aren’t such a danger to everyone else.”
“But Shadow didn’t seem very...” Jen trailed off, thinking about it and realizing how dangerous the idea of being able to change one’s form could be. Slowly, she nodded and looked down at the table, “I’ll gladly help if I can. I owe you that much.”
Aboard the Claw, a large amount of the old quarters space had been converted into a single room. It was empty. The size of five large quarters, the room now served as a place for sparring. It happened little, but was a place that Akan found he could rest his mind and let things work themselves out. So now he sat near the center of the room, not focusing on anything but his shoulder.
That blaster had to have been set on a lower power for the first shot. It didn’t hurt anymore...but the placement should have killed him instantly. And the second shot had burned a deep mark in the Y-Wing, so either it was a second weapon or the power was toned down. Either way...it didn’t make sense. Whoever had fired the first shot was impossibly good, predicting movements long before they occurred. But that still didn’t explain why the shot was such a low power.
“Your sulk like this a lot?” a voice asked from behind him. He’d not heard the door open, so it surprised him slightly.
Akan glanced over his shoulder to see Shadow standing with her arms crossed over her chest. She was wearing that body suit again and her tail swished very slightly. He then started to get up, “Need something?”
Shadow’s footsteps were light, but he could hear her walking closer, “Need to work my muscles. Care to let out my frustration?”
“Your frustration?” Akan responded with a raised eyebrow, turning around and giving her a bored look, “But its been a while since I’ve gotten any practice.”
“Anything goes,” she said with a grin growing on her face as she stretched some. She caught onto a stray thought and her grin grew, “Anything means anything.”
For the first time in a very long time, a smile grew on Akan’s face. Interesting. Obviously, she trusted her own skills to keep her from getting killed, but at the same time she had to have trusted his. Or...or she was just so arrogant that it didn’t matter. Or both. He cracked his knuckles and gave her a look, planting his feet and standing in a fairly basic combat stance he’d learned in Spec Force(the fact that he could think of it that way was amazing, but he somehow didn’t grasp onto that much).
Shadow arched her back and stretched like a big cat, a few things popping as she did so, and then shook her head. There was a predatory look growing on her face that he’d seen before. Somehow he was starting to worry. Of course, he wasn’t given much chance to. Thankfully, he’d at least seen her fighting some, so he had a slight idea of what she was about to do.
Which was actually very simple. In every definition of the word, she pounced at him. What he hadn’t expected was to see claws. Akan stepped to the side and ducked a swipe at his face. Surely she wouldn’t actually hit him with claws like that...Again, she gave him no time to think. Once she had a stable footing, Shadow spun around with a punch to his stomach. He caught her arm, but her other hand got his, and she tossed him over her shoulder and to the ground.
Akan hit with a loud thud and a grunt...and a pop from his spine. She was strong, too. Wonderful. Before she had a chance to bring her knee down onto his chest, Akan managed to roll out of the way. He got himself up onto his feet in time to twist to the side, out of the way of Shadow’s claws far too close to his waist. She really wasn’t playing around. Or rather, she was...but played rough. He wasn’t even getting a chance to swing at her, just dodging, ducking, and getting out of the way as best he could. Thankfully, he was calm enough to use the Force to attempt at least a little sensing of her actions. It was the only way he was avoiding a majority of those strikes.
Then, when he ducked out of the way and started to the left, he got surprised. She must have anticipated what that, as he met with a knee to the face. Akan yelped as he was sent onto his back again. Trying to ignore the pain, he felt himself being caught up in adrenaline and the Force itself. Time seemed to slow down...Shadow was moving still, bringing a clawed hand down in a slash towards his shoulder. Not completely aware of what he was doing, he reacted.
In one swift movement, he rolled to the side and got the lightsaber off of his belt. As her claws got close, he brought the lightsaber upu and activated it mid swing. The snap-hiss of the blade sounded through the room just a second before a loud cry of pain from Shadow. Akan was still moving, getting to his feet and to a defensive stance before he actually saw what had happened. Shadow stood looking surprised, her right arm was missing the bottom third of it, which was cleanly cut on the ground. Strangely enough, she had a smile on her face. A toothy, dangerous one, but a smile none the less.
She slowly turned to him, and Akan watched as her arm literally regrew itself. In a matter of seconds, she was back to ‘normal’. Akan couldn’t help but be amazed at how...handy that talent was. But it had obviously still hurt, so it had its limits...they stood studying each other for a long time. Akan with his lightsaber still activated and glowing a bright blue-green in front of him. Shadow with a grin on her face and claws still out, she stood in a ready to pounce way. She was twitching slightly, ready to move.
Catching the still surprised look on his face, her grin grew, “I did say...anything goes.” That’s when she lunged at him again.
Akan was still mostly on the defensive, using the lightsaber to ward Shadow back when she got too close. It had become an interesting game of feinting and trying to figure out what exactly the other would do. It was strange, but Akan found himself...enjoying it. Shadow would not hesitate to cut him open, but at the same time, she wasn’t too afraid of his lightsaber. She could reform her arm, but it had obviously caused a great deal of pain and effort. Which was probably the reason she was being so cautious.
With a quick move, Shadow started towards his left side. Akan brought his lightsaber over in front of him to keep her back. She was, however, anticipating this, and pushed off her foot to roll around and under his blade, bringing in a claw towards his stomach. He did his best to pull back and swing the lightsaber around to ward her off, but she was simply too fast. The claws dug deep into his right side and dragged across his side as she moved around behind him. The pain shot up through him, and he gritted his teeth as Akan he followed her move, pivoting around on one foot and slashing across with the saber.
Staying low, Shadow avoided the cut and then pulled back to a safer position. Akan took a step back also, trying to use the Force to calm himself and ignore the pain. He was not a healer, and gave a glance down to the four long marks that dug through the brown jacket he wore. There was red blood seeping out, and he decided it was best to not look to that anymore. When he looked back, Shadow was licking her claws clean, and seemingly enjoying it far too much. Steadying himself, Akan watched as she finished and then watched him with an even more dangerous eye, “Tastes good...”
Oh. Great. If she wasn’t worrying enough before, this just topped it. Not giving him a chance to respond, however, she dove at him again. She moved towards his right side again, and he managed to get the lightsaber up and in front of him in time, which caused Shadow to pull back. He wasn’t going to win this one...but why wasn’t he stopping? This worried him, as he rarely took such risks. But something about Shadow...and the air in general. It was intoxicating really. He may get hurt worse, but in the end he’d be fine...and this was well worth it.
As Akan was bringing his lightsaber back into a more neutral defensive position, Shadow came at him quickly. Surprised by this, he tried spinning the blade around to force her back again. This didn’t work, as she had moved in a way to get his wrists. Shadow pulled his arms up, then kicked him in the stomach. He grunted painfully and his grip loosened on the lightsaber. She twisted his wrists around and pulled his arms to the side, sending the lightsaber off to the ground a good distance away. Once it hit, it deactivated. Of course, Akan only knew this from the sound, as his attention was on Shadow. He managed to kick her in the side, but it did little good as she quickly returned it with a knee to his injured side.
Akan let out a painful yelp but managed to stay up. Too quickly for him to react, Shadow pulled his arms around and flung him face first into the wall. The thud was loud and probably not indicative as to how painful it actually was to hit the solid durasteel. But she only had one hand on his wrists now. Ignoring the pain as best he could(and it was getting much more difficult), Akan twisted one arm free and sent a fist into Shadow’s face. Though he didn’t hit too hard, it sent her back enough to give him a chance. With the small second that was granted to him, he dove across the room towards the lightsaber. He rolled over to it, picking it up and getting to his feet. There were a few red marks on the floor now from where his still bloodied side had hit.
He took no notice of this, and ignited the lightsaber again. Akan’s looked beat up, defeated, and generally terrible, but he held the lightsaber in an effort that made it look like he was fighting for his life. Maybe he was...something deep within him was growing. As he stood there, he could see things he’d only slowly started to allow back into his memory. A situation long ago, much like this one...Coruscant, during the invasion. He and Mare had gotten to the ground, and were moving in to take out one of the control towers that relayed orders to the planetary and orbital batteries. They barely succeeded, but he’d failed at what he felt was his real job. She was killed in the escape after they’d made it into their X-Wings. Akan hadn’t thought to check to make sure the rest of the personnel of the station were gone. She’d died that day because of his oversight.
Once long ago, he’d convinced himself that those actions had earned him death. That was the day Raan Maxwell disappeared, and Akan Tavos came into being. But that wasn’t right...he was still who he’d always been, and made the same mistakes. Shadow could see something in him now, something she’d not seen before. His eyes looked more blank, and his focus had obviously faded. Or rather, changed. Something was more determined and dangerous than before.
A smile crept onto his face, and he spoke in a low voice, “You’re easing up. C’mon...” he motioned towards him with his lightsaber, “Finish this.”
It was the way he said it. If Shadow had known him for longer, the older instincts within her would not have been so quick to take over. She wouldn’t have grinned. But instead, she just allowed herself to react. When he finished his words, Shadow was already moving. Akan brought his lightsaber in a dangerous swing towards her, but she literally jumped over him completely. Once landing behind him, she growled and kicked him to the ground. A moment later, she’d pounced on him, claws digging into Akan’s upper back. He let out a cry of pain, but was pinned and couldn’t move. Then, without thinking at all, Shadow wrapped her claws around his neck and dug them in. Akan’s body shook violently for a moment, and then went still. Blood flowed out across the floor. He no longer moved.
Suddenly, Shadow’s mind caught up with her actions. At first she panicked. He was dead. She’d killed before...many many times. Killing wasn’t any problem. But he’d...he wasn’t...why had he asked her to kill him? Why had she listened?! That human was so...stupid. Yet...yet she couldn’t just leave it at this. Her mind hadn’t even thought of what others would say about Akan being dead like this. Instead, she worried more about herself. A past of cold killing was behind her, and it was no time to return to that. It would never be that time. But he was dead...
Something in her sparked. There was something she could do...but it was dangerous for both and would have to be one immediately. It could already be too late. But...she had to try. Shadow’s mind realized the consequences of what this meant if she went through with it. No longer a single life. Two lives. But this was her fault for not controlling herself. She had to fix it. And she would. Shadow then closed her eyes, and concentrated. Hopefully it would work...
Chapter 16: Just When You Thought It Couldn't Get Any Stranger...
Ow. Ow said it all for Akan. Ow pretty much described the extent of his existence for the last...the last long time. How long? Wait...the last moment he remembered was Shadow’s claws digging into his neck, then nothing. Then...this. But ow. Why ow? Why anything? That was...death wasn’t it? One shouldn’t feel anything after that. Or...should they? Honestly, how would you know? Sure, there were stories of Force spirits, but Akan doubted they existed in a state of ‘ow’. So again, the question of why ‘ow’ returned to his...mind? Thoughts. Yes, thoughts.
[You’re going to have to move or we’ll be stuck like this...] a voice said. It was in his mind....he’d heard a voice similar to that before, only not in his mind. Thoughts. Whatever. [Its your mind, you are alive you know.] the voice interrupted his thoughts again. So he was alive again, and now completely crazy. Hearing voices. Wonderful. But...Akan could feel other voices. Distant and strange, like thoughts that weren’t his own. He latched onto one for a moment and got an image.
The training room. Blood was still on the floor and wall in places, but the focus was on...a body, face first on the floor.. Off to the side of the body was a pile of clothes. His clothes. Wait...that body...it looked like Shadow’s yet...male looking. And the hair. And...and...the arm moved. Akan could have sworn he did that. Then the image faded and he was left in the nothing of wondering what the Sith was going on.
[I’ll explain after we’re completely separated] the voice said again. That voice. He pinned it. Shadow’s. But why in his mind? Too many why’s. [Our tails are still connected...I can’t do that part on my own.]
Huh...? He felt something in his mind....Shadow. She was searching something out. She found it, and he felt a strange energy growing from where there had been nothing. He could...feel his body again. But it was different. Stronger. Bigger, too. And something...his thoughts trailed down, and he found a series of muscles and bones that had never been there before. That...shouldn’t be there. He moved them.
[Hey! Stop playing with the our tails and move forward!] Akan hadn’t realized he’d been moving that muscle for a few...minutes. It was strangely entertaining. That was awkward. He seemed like he was getting distracted much more easily. Wait. Focus. Task at hand. Tail. Right. But why ‘our tails’? Wait...stuck. He let his min travel farther down, and it all got even more fuzzy. Stuck! Tails were...fused? Connected? Stuck! Why? Not another why...FOCUS! Move. Alright. Forward.
He did. Carefully and with eyes still closed. One arm moved up, and dragged him across the floor while the other did the same. As he did this, he could hear...feel, just generally know that Shadow was doing the same thing in the other direction. Then, it was gone. Well, not completely, but the part of him that somehow understood what was going on figured that the ‘stuck’ problem was solved. He stopped moving. Feeling was ‘returning’ in a way to his entire body, and he was noticing many differences that he’d last checked. Mostly, this was along the lines of muscles that were never there before.
He heard movement and shifted his ear towards it. What? Shifted his ear? How did he...? Hmm...there was another new muscle. And the ears were...different. He could hear better, and was surprised at how much louder the ship was. He twisted the ear the other direction to see if it worked. It did. Another sound behind him, and Akan quickly moved his ear to listen. Shadow. How did he know? He could feel her thoughts, and knew she was moving.
[You’ll get used to the link...can you say anything?] Akan heard Shadow ask him as she stopped moving. Say anything...?
[How’m I s’posed to talk? Everythings all...all...] suddenly Akan realized that was his ‘voice’. He’d just thought about it...at her. In a way. Not in any way that much different from the Force, but...he could tell he wasn’t using that for this communication. He just thought at her.
Akan then felt a hand on his shoulder, then heard Shadow’s actual voice, “It’ll probably be very...um...confusing for a while. Can you open your eyes at all or speak?”
Akan did manage to turn his head so his nose wasn’t crushed on the floor. Or at least, he was pretty sure that was what he’d done. But eyes opening was somehow very hard to do. As was working the mouth at all. [What...happened?]
“Well,” Shadow’s hand left his shoulder, and Akan could feel her thoughts race through how to explain things. She tried sending images, but it did nothing but confuse him more. Realizing this, she sighed and tried explaining it as best she could in words, “You um...I...got a little a carried away. You kind of...well...”
[You killed me?!] Akan’s mind had caught on to that much, and though it had made sense considering, it was still shocking and insane in more than one way.
“No! Yes...well...” her voice became accusing, “You told me to! Argh...look, that’s not the point. Just listen because this is um...important. Before you were completely...gone, I sort of made you a new...well...you.”
Again, this was confirming what he was slowly figuring out on his own(with the help of her thoughts), but hearing it was just more to add on to the current feeling of chaos. [How in the Force did you do that?!]
“Not in the Force...” Shadow trailed off, obviously not catching the expression and taking it literally, “Listen it’s a technique of my...our species.”
[Our species?!] alright, now it was going to far.
He felt a strange emotion from Shadow then. Almost like she was hiding behind a wall and talking quietly around it with large amounts of things in the way to deflect any attacks that were sure to come, “Um...yes? We’re the um...same now. I didn’t...I mean, it was the only way! And...and I didn’t mean for things to get so crazy and I...it was the only way...”
There was a silence. Obviously, she expected him to murder her at this point. Then, he broke the silence. He had spent the time doing a mix of thinking and figuring out how to get his mouth to work. Akan managed it, and his voice even sounded different. This was because he was talking through sharper, slightly longer teeth, “...its okay...”
That got a surprised reaction out of her. Akan could feel Shadow’s mind racing trying to figure out what to do. She’d expected a much harsher reaction. Carefully, she said, “Um...you need to know. We’re essentially the uh...same person now.”
[Its why we can...talk like this] she continued in his mind, which surprised him but at the same time was somehow normal already. [The big thing is that um...well, we’ll live as long as each other, really.] Shadow suddenly noticed that made little sense, and tried again. [What I mean is that...well, when one of us dies the other will too...so we’re kind of stuck in that. But it was the only way...]
Taking this all in, Akan finally managed to get an eye open. He was, in fact, face first on the floor. Shadow was sitting crossed legged on a brown pile of what were most likely his clothes. She was wearing her usual skin-tight suit, but it was smaller than usual. No longer did it cover her entire body(minus feet, hands, and head), but started just above her knees and ended a little below her neck with short ‘sleeves’ on her arms. It also looked...different in a way. Less colour to it.
“My morphsuit was...strained,” she trailed off and he watched her reach over to him. She put her hand on his back, but it felt different, “It split itself, so you have one too. Its sometimes hard to tell you’re wearing it...but it won’t hurt you. Both of them will grow back in time, but they’ll be...small for a while,” she caught onto another thought of his, “Yes, they’re alive. Not intelligent, but alive. Now, its really designed to give you something to wear when you morph....but you should wear it all the time because of the cold.”
Morph? Wait...she meant. But he didn’t know how. Maybe it was simple? No...not right now. Focus. Some things still confused him. [Can you...help me up?]
Shadow nodded and as Akan strained muscles that had never been used before(which was odd in its own right), she helped to pull him to his feet. He nearly fell onto her, but Shadow held him up as he got used to the balance difference.
“Tail for balance...” she said quietly, still sounding slightly worried like she expected him to kill her at any moment.
He managed a nod, but wasn’t sure how to use said tail for said balance. So he just let things happened. In a few minutes, he’d worked it out, and was able to stand up, mostly, straight. There was a large mirror on the far side of the training room, which was a remnant of the old quarters that had never been removed. Shadow caught onto his thoughts, and helped him to walk over to it.
When he got to it, his mind finished computing everything and put the last pieces together. There stood Shadow, looking the same as usual. Not too tall, shoulder length white hair with a black stripe down the center, two feline ears and purple eyes with feline pupils, long tail, and her smaller morphsuit. But next to her, was what Akan knew to be himself but still wasn’t sure of.
He was about the same height as before, but it was obvious he had newer muscles in most places. Of course, the skin tight morphsuit probably helped that some, but it would have been noticeable either way. His hair was about the same length as before, scruffy as usual, but...white like Shadow’s. Except no black stripe. Well, there was a stripe but it was a metallic blue colour. He decided not to ask where that came from. He realized the reason his hair looked so much scruffier was the fact that he no longer had human ears to keep it back more. His ears were now up higher on his head, and feline like Shadow’s. His eyes, too had the same slit...but they were the same blue colour as before. More of an ice blue than the colour of his stripe. His skin was darker, like hers was. In fact, exactly the same colour...almost no surprise. He opened his mouth to confirm that his teeth were in fact much sharper, then looked down. Flicked that muscle that had never been there...a tail flicked, with the same white/blue markings as his hair. Okay...um...
[Now what...?] he asked, not sure if his voice would have managed the confusion that was finally settling.
Shadow looked at him in the mirror, then up at him. She had an arm holding him up still, and it was strange how she was so much...different than before. She managed a shrug, then a grin appeared on her face. Not the dangerous grin from before, but a more friendly one. It almost looked out of place, “Your guess is as good as mine...but um, probably should tell Ansion. And well..welcome back as an Alraxian.”
Alraxian. So now he knew the species name. From Raan the young pilot...to Akan the mercenary Jedi...to...an Alraxian. No knew name. He’d died enough. Reborn was an understatement. A grin started growing on his face. Never had he ever needed to ask for an interesting life. Now, he got to live a second interesting one.
Wow. Now *that* was some good stuff. I'm off to find my socks, where the last few updates just rocked them off into the other room.
Very, very nice.
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After taking forever to get back to his quarters(with Shadow’s help still), Akan had sat down and tried not to think too much. Shadow had gone off to...explain things as best she could. Hopefully it would be better than what she’d explained to him. For a long time, he simply stared at the wall, letting his mind slowly go over everything and get used to...things. He found that while he was stronger, faster, and generally better at most things...simple things distracted him. Especially moving objects. Fast moving ones. He had found the strength to not pounce and maul anything that did that, but it was still slightly disturbing.
Akan brought his hand up to look at it for a long time. Exactly the same as before...a little bigger, but human like. Not padded or anything else like that. But there was something...he thought about it, and in a moment claws extended. That was strange...they didn’t come OUT of the hand so much as...the hand became the claws. He thought about it a moment, and when the claws faded back to his hand, he’d figured it out. Morphing. Simple, yes...but that’s the only thing that could explain it.
Next, he found himself looking up at the hair in front of his face. White. Well, no...the hair that was over his the side of his face was the blue colour, though he could see a hint of the white in the corner of his eyes. Akan turned to look over his shoulder, down at the tail. He moved it, and found himself a bit too fascinated by that movement. Somehow, he had a feeling that pouncing and mauling one’s own tail was not a good idea.
His attention then turned to the morphsuit he wore. It was a blueish colour. Strange how blues kept coming up. There was probably a reason for that, as Akan had decided that coincidences did not exist at this point. The suit clung to him comfortably, but he still felt somewhat cold. An odd cold, as he’d never felt the ship to be that cold before. The temperature in his room had been turned up significantly, and that had helped. He sighed, and looked to his brown jacket and trousers sitting next to him on the bed. They would probably still fit, but the matter of tail and trousers was paramount in his mind. He attempted this anyway, finding that the jacket itself was no trouble, and still quiet comfortable(if not a little tight across the chest). The trousers, however, took some work, but he managed to find a comfortable place for them. Stupid tail.
A knock at the door made him jump. And when he did that, it nearly sent him into the ceiling head first. Calm. Calm...okay. Just the door. Just the door, “Um...come in?”
The door slid open and Jen Zaarin stood there. She looked somewhat surprised, but obviously she’d been told what had happened. She ran a hand through her hair nervously and managed a smile, “I’m not here to uh...stare or anything. Shadow said what happened, but Ansion. He wanted you to know what was going on.”
“Oh! Oh, right,” Akan nodded and stepped over to the small desk and had a seat. He motioned for her to come in. Jen did so, and had a seat on the bed.
There was an awkward silence, then she spoke up, “We’re not going to Coruscant...Ansion spoke with the New Republic and he got some information. He seemed very adamant to find the Imperials who attacked us, and with the Republic’s help, they’ve tracked them down to an old Imperial outpost on Naboo. The planet’s still mostly under Imperial control...an Ansion’s got us heading that direction.”
Naboo. Mare’s home. He’d never been there before. Interesting how some things turned out. Akan did his best to keep his focus on what she had said, though, “We lost a good amount of friends on Endor. He doesn’t like losing people.”
Jen nodded, her eyes more on the floor than anything. That was really all she had to tell him. The silence was annoying, and she broke it with a fairly stupid question, “How do you...feel?”
“I’m alright...I guess...” he trailed off, almost grinning. How was he supposed to feel? Akan looked over to Jen, “Don’t really know what I’m supposed to do. I mean...I’m still me. Mostly.”
Again, she nodded, obviously not sure what to say. She’d not known him for long, but to have him now being all...different suddenly was enough to confuse anyone. Without really saying anything, Jen started to get up and leave.
Upon noticing this, Akan blurted out a question that had just popped into his head, “You’re staying with us?”
That stopped her. It was an innocent question, really, but it was more in the way he’d said it. She was smart enough to know that it came from the fact that she knew about his past. From what Ansion had said, Akan never talked about it. The fact that he talked about it with her was another thing. She had to choose her words carefully, but she did nod, “My job with the New Republic is pretty much over with. They didn’t say that I was needed anywhere else...so I guess I’m staying for a while.”
Without giving him a chance to say anything else, she left. Akan looked to the desk and sighed. Everything was all strange. Why had he said that? Sure, she was nice and good at listening, but even he had recognized the way he’d spoken. She’d obviously taken it as him being interested in her. But no...that wasn’t it. It was more like a child asking a parent not to leave. But he’d not even meant to...why? Everything was so...
[Technically, we’re children...] Shadow’s ‘voice’ interrupted his thoughts.
AH! She’d been listening? Well, okay, he’d listened in when she was talking with Ansion and such. Her thoughts were interesting, but he hadn’t expected she was paying so much attention to his to pick up things like that. [Children...?]
Her ‘voice’ sounded strangely sheepish. [Um...yeah. One of those things I forgot to tell you...]
[One of?!] he stood up to go find her. [Where are you anyway?]
[On the way to you, actually...need to clear up some things before we arrive.]
She did...feel closer. He could figure that from a mix of the Force and their, for lack of a better word, Link. Its what she’d called it, and worked well enough. Akan wondered how long it would be before they arrived. Naboo was a good distance from Endor. Probably a day...though depending on when they’d changed routes, it could be a matter of hours. There would likely be a meeting before arrival to go over what was going to happen, so Akan let worries about that slip out of his mind. There were enough worries at this point. He closed his eyes and let the Force assist in calming himself as he waited for Shadow.
Well I am officially hooked. The story alone reads wonderfully.
Is this still all considered "background" or have you broken into things that happened in actual role play?
If it is the latter, I would have loved to see the Shadow & Raan's players RPing the "I have a tail!/stop playing with our tail!" interaction!
I was laughing out loud at work with that part! I'm also getting ramped up to run my own D20 SW games. The feel of this storyline so far mirrors what I have in mind pretty closely. Kind of a Cyberpunk 2020/ShadowRun version of SW.
Btw, watch out for your posting style of every day. I'm sure alot of people, including myself, are loving the great story and bountiful updates, but you may put more than a few people through horrible withdrawal if you miss a few days!!!
Is this still all considered "background" or have you broken into things that happened in actual role play?
The actual game started with the Endor raid, however a few things have been changed to fit a better story telling. Its really hard for even me to tell anymore, as after we worked together to put it into a more story format anyway. It wasn't very coherent though, so that's my excuse for writing it now(and the fact that there were some REALLY crazy things in the original game that just needed to be changed for the story)
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If it is the latter, I would have loved to see the Shadow & Raan's players RPing the "I have a tail!/stop playing with our tail!" interaction!
That was a mix of RPing and working it together. We had an interesting style of running things, where I would trade of GMing with one other. We both knew the general direction of things, but would trade off every few sessions and run a part of things to get it moving. During the whole tail thing, that was me as the PC for Raan/Akan/Whatever(Yes, he does end up having one more name, but its that FINAL one...still a while until that one, though).
And while I love that, my favorite is what became a running "You KILLED me!" comment every so often.
Quote:
Btw, watch out for your posting style of every day. I'm sure alot of people, including myself, are loving the great story and bountiful updates, but you may put more than a few people through horrible withdrawal if you miss a few days!!!
Don't worry, I won't miss too much, and if I do, I'll warn ahead of time. I've got a good amount of time on my hands, so I usually end up just writing one part at a time, then post it. Probably should start on tommorrows(wait, its 12AM...), err, today's soon.
And a little note: We HAVE encountered the 4th PC mentioned in the first post already. Voort will officially join up later and add to the insanity.
For once, Akan was early to the meeting. Despite his long talk with Shadow, and how much it truly caught his interest, he just wanted to relax some and pretend things were mostly normal. No one else was there yet, so he had a little time to mentally go over everything. Of all the things she’d told him, one stuck in his mind the most. All of his life, he’d lived on names that he’d created for himself. Since he’d never known his parents, Akan simply decided on a name that fit him. Raan Maxwell fit well for a long time, but then he changed. He changed so much that the name no longer was him. So he became Akan Tavos. But now...
Shadow was not her actual name. It was a call sign she’d picked up ‘cycles ago’ as she’d put it. Her real name was Marix BlueIce. She had not gone by that name for as long as she could remember(in fact, she’d spoken of it as if it were more of a dream). Because of this, she had literally ordered him to still use the name ‘Shadow’, as that was who she was. But now...
Now, Akan was her ‘Nothlit’. The word meant nothing to him, but it was the term she used to refer to the body she had created, and him on occasion. And as her Nothlit, he was in all respects her equal. This meant that he was now apart of the same Clan. BlueIce. Interesting that it was another ‘blue’...three at least, four counting the morphsuit. Akan BlueIce. One day he’d find a stable name. Obviously, today had not been that day. In fact, it wasn’t the day for a stable anything.
He couldn’t help but grin at that. Shadow had explained morphing to him, but he’d not grasped it well. The idea of forcing his cells to become something they weren’t felt painful just thinking about it. According to her, it was painful without proper training. Apparently, she planned to train him. Wonderful. He’d not had a say in this, either. But he’d not fought this decision, as a small part of him was strongly interested by it. This, of course, was the same part of his mind that had to be told not to pounce Shadow’s tail when it swished, so it wasn’t to be trusted.
The most interesting thing she had spoke of was the Force, itself. She’d almost been preaching to him more than suggesting the ideas she had. According to Shadow, her people saw no definite distinction between the ‘Dark Side’ and the ‘Light Side’ of the Force. To them, it was simply the Force. Magick. You could not have one without the other, so one must learn to balance both within themselves. She told him that she would be watching him carefully, as he was close to offsetting this balance with too much Light. She wouldn’t have cared if not for their new connection. It could effect each of them. Which brought her into a delicate discussion about pain. The Link they shared was a great advantage, but held the weakness that pain was transferred across it. Not as bad as the pain that was felt directly, but an echo of sorts. She’d demonstrated this be digging her claws into her own arm. Akan had cringed, feeling a strange shadow-pain in his own arm.
It was something to keep in mind, of course. One of many things. The foremost being ‘Don’t die, because then we’ll both die’. This was quickly answered with ‘Well, don’t kill me again!’. It then had devolved into the tossing of insults, but never going so far as violence. They were only...half serious. Being able to know the other’s thoughts so clearly made it much easier to see the truth about the other. Some of the things were strange, but all they really picked up without trying was to surface thoughts. Anything else would have to be worked on...and Akan was in no way going to do that...yet. Shadow, however, had taken great interest in his mind. It was odd because Akan could feel her ‘looking’ through things.
And then, the others entered the meeting room. No Shadow this time, just the normal five of them. Ansion and the four Division leaders. Of course, all of them gave Akan a long look, but said nothing about what had happened. In a few moments, after some general small talk amongst them, Ansion quieted them down and motioned to the holoscreen. On it, was an image of the green planet, Naboo. One section was marked with a red square, as were two sections in space.
Ansion pointed to the two marked off sections in space, “According to the latest reports from the New Republic have two fleet groups placed in orbit around Naboo. The only planets that have this kind of security are Kuat, Bastion, and the other major planets. This indicates that there is something serious occurring on the planet. The section there on the planet itself is the Imperial garrison. It has grown considerably in the last year, and has more than just the New Republic worried. Now, you all know how much I hate losing good people...but we may lose a lot in this.”
The female Duros, Elona, looked to Ansion with a critical eye, “In what? You are doing your best to avoid telling us exactly what is going on.”
Sighing and nodding, Ansion closed his large eyes a moment, “We’re going to work with the New Republic in assaulting the planet. We will arrive about ten minutes after the Republic’s fleet has. They will engage the first fleet and attempt to also attract the attention of the second. We will exit hyperspace and move directly to the planet. Once the assault transports have launched, the Claw will leave. There is simply no way for this ship to survive out there. This means that once we’re done, we’ll be getting out with the Republic. Our destination is the garrison, of course. However, I will again be taking Division Three and leading them in an assault on a nearby city as a diversion. Division Two will also provide a diversionary assault, and their efforts will be aided by a Republic ground team that should already be down by the time we get there.”
The map zoomed in to a large complex, the Imperial garrison. Ansion allowed them all a moment to look it over, and then said, “Division One will land on the north side and begin their assault there. Four will take the east. The south will be taken by another group of Republic soldiers. And the west...Akan, Shadow, and Zaarin are going that way.”
“Wait wait wait,” Akan raised his hand, “Jen? She’s no good in a fight.”
“Yes, but our goal is to find out what is going on there,” Ansion said simply, “And once that is known, decide whether it needs to be taken out or not. Zaarin can assist with computer codes, and determining what is happening. You and Shadow should think of yourselves as he bodyguards.”
Ahh, fun. Not that he considered it babysitting...but, well, it was as close as he’d been to that in a long time. [You’re not the only one.] AH! Shadow was listening in...he’d have to get used to that. And probably mention something to Akan. [Awww, its not like I won’t find out anyway.]
Akan sighed a little too loudly, and got some looks. [Do you mind?]
[Yes] Shadow responded simply. Of course, Ansion had gone on talking again, and was explaining that there were many troopers stationed at the garrison. It went on with generally pointless details(to Akan at least), and they left to get ready.
No break. No rest. Off they went again. But this time, Akan understood Shadow much better. Perhaps that would help them out. But taking Jen along...he didn’t like the idea of having to worry about one life, but he was stuck with two lives now. Jen just added a third. Akan stretched some, finding that he was doing the same cat-like stretch that he’d found amusing from Shadow. Damn! How was he supposed to focus like this? How was he even supposed to fight? Hearing Shadow’s thoughts was distracting even when he wasn’t trying. But having her digging through his just made it even worse. Did she plan to do that the whole time?!
[Yes] came the same response as before. He got the feeling that she was just fascinated by humans, and had never had a chance to really learn so much about them. Damn! Why did it have to be Akan?!
Chaos didn’t exactly describe the scene around Naboo well enough. At least the Y-Wing and the three of them aboard were fine. Akan was piloting as before, Jen in the gunner’s seat, and Shadow(in her kitten like form again) purring quietly at getting an ear scratch in Jen’s lap. Filling the viewport in front of him was the planet Naboo. But that wasn’t the source of the chaos. The source was far to the left side of the planet, where three very large fleets were engaged. The New Republic had sent a considerable force against the planet, catching the Imperials off guard. This meant that both of the defense fleets responded immediately, as did the fighters on the ground. To add to the chaos, word had gotten out on the planet, and riots were breaking out.
The people of Naboo were never friends to the Empire, but such a strong hold had been taken on the planet that the people had simply lived with it. There was nothing they could do. Of course, now they could. Many New Republic ships had come down near major cities, taking out Imperial garrisons and forces. Akan had thought this was more of a hit and fade move at first, but now he realized it was a full blown planetary assault. Which meant he’d have to get his job done quickly. The Empire would do its best to get anything important off the planet, even if they succeeded in driving off the Republic. Ahead of him, the four assault transports from the Claw were diving in to their respective points on the planet. The Claw was already retreating out of the planet’s gravity well and preparing for hyperspace.
So far, so good. Which meant it was going to get very bad soon. As the ship dove through Naboo’s atmosphere, Akan’s sensors locked onto the garrison they were to get into. Strangely enough, it was easy to see. This was because of the green lights that were shooting up into the sky from it. Turbolaser batteries. That was overkill. Thankfully, they weren’t good at hitting starfighters(even slow Y-Wings). The assault transports were what had to worry.
“Going to have to make a run and take some of the ground forces out before landing,” Akan said in a strangely calm voice over his shoulder. This was strange because the entire flight he’d been fidgeting, whimpering, and whining about the seats not being designed for tails.
He soon spotted their side of the station(which was almost as big as a city, itself), and noted it was only occupied by two blazing turbolasers. The Republic forces already on the ground on the other sides were keeping most of the troops occupied. Good. Or bad, since that was yet another thing to go wrong. Before leaving, Akan had switched the systems so that he had weapons control locked forward. This meant that the ion cannon could no longer fire as a turret, but at least he didn’t have to worry about Jen or Shadow breaking anything.
[HEY! I can shoot things!] Shadow responded to his thoughts.
He simply sent her a mental growl and let the targeting reticle on his HUD slowly come to bear on one of the turbolasers. The second it locked on, the turbolaser spun around to start firing at him. They hadn’t detected such a small fighter coming in(as his was the only fighter to come into the atmosphere and they had been looking for assault ships). As the turbolaser fired shots over and around the Y-Wing, Akan shot off a single proton torpedo. The ship shook slightly from the force of the blue streak now leaving it, a testament to the age of the Y-Wing.
In a few more seconds, the torpedo impacted with the large battery, destroying it in a bright flash. Alright, so that was probably overkill. Akan couldn’t help but grin a little as he started to level out the ship. The other battery had taken notice of him, and was bearing its two turrets on the Y-Wing as he switched to the lasers. Dropping to an almost dangerously low altitude(which just happened to be below the firing arc of the battery), Akan held in the trigger. Bright red blasts shot out at the battery, impacting it one after another until it shattered in a flash. Quickly, Akan pulled the Y-Wing up and out of the way, starting in a long loop to get them into a position to land.
Through all of this, he’d not noticed the fact that Jen was clinging to the seat. She wasn’t a fighter...and being in a starfighter and being shot at pulling the stunts he had was more than enough to make anyone nervous. The fact that she could only see the aftermath(and the turbolaser shots flying PAST them) made it worse. Shadow on the other hand, seemed to be enjoying the excitement, though Akan could feel that she’d rather be out there having ‘fun’ instead of sitting around. But then again...ear scratch. That single action had pretty much made her useless to the world.
In a few more moments, the Y-Wing was down. As the canopy opened and Akan got out, he heard a whimpering noise from Shadow. He glanced back to see Jen had gotten up and was also climbing out. This, according to Shadow’s thoughts, was bad because ear scratch had stopped. Then something changed, and he looked to see the ‘usual’ Shadow also climbing out looking like nothing had happened. Akan was on the grass covered ground first, and helped Jen down. He was going to help Shadow, but she had hopped down gracefully and was looking to the complex in front of them with interest. It wasn’t all that different from the one on Endor, except that it was much more obviously Imperial. The flags, markings, and general no-fun straight lines everywhere did that. There was a single entrance, a small single door almost hidden in between two of the buildings and a wall.
Shadow and Akan exchanged looks, and without a word(they didn’t need them anymore, anyway) started towards it. Jen had drawn her small blaster pistol and followed them. The quiet was unnerving her some. She found it odd that Akan was so quiet. Maybe that was because of all the changes recently. He did have a lot to think about. But now wasn’t the time for this. She had a job to do...even if it wasn’t her place on the battlefield.
The garrison was proving to be very much true to its namesake. It seemed like no matter where they went, there would be at least a small group of Imperials. This would normally have annoyed Akan...but something was different. He felt...felt...playful wasn’t the right word, but it was probably the closest thing there was to it. Currently, they stood within a small room, where Jen was searching through the files on the computer. He and Shadow simply stood around waiting, but Akan caught a hint of a grin on her face.
“What?” he asked, sounding worried because he could tell he was the cause of that grin.
Her grin grew suddenly, and she fought back a laugh, “You! Its funny watching you trying to fight back being so constantly happy.”
Akan realized that he had been fighting back a smile on his face, but he still wasn’t sure why, “Is this another thing you ‘forgot’ to tell me about?”
Shadow laughed this time, “Awww, you just like being depressed all the time. Poor little jai...”
He glared at her. Of course, a very small part of him felt he should pounce and maul her, but Akan had the self control to know that this was not the time. He’d get her for that later.
[Hah! No you won’t!] she ‘said’, easily catching onto his thoughts.
Akan didn’t get a chance to respond. Jen let out a sigh and turned from the computer, “There’s not much here. Nothing at all to indicate any kind of research of secret project. Only thing that they seem to be keeping protected is an officer.”
“Well, that’s something to look into,” Akan said with a raised eyebrow, “Can you find out anymore than that?”
Jen took a moment to search through files, then nodded and said over her shoulder, “Being held in a lower level of the garrison. Apparently, its off limits to all but a select few in the base.”
That even got Shadow’s attention. Breaking into things that she was supposed to be in seemed to peak her interest. Or at least, that was what Akan figured from the thoughts he was getting. Akan couldn’t help the grin, feeling strangely good about all of this, “I guess three more can be added to that list. Where to?”
Jen looked over the computer more, than turned it off and pointed to a door on the other side, “First left, then room on the right. Should be a turbolift beyond that.”
Shadow was already moving to the door. Akan was going to mention that she should be careful, but then he realized he didn’t have to say it. She knew he was thinking it, so she knew it. That train of thought caused him a slight headache. There was such a thing as being too young for insanity. Akan believed he currently fell into the category, but the galaxy decided otherwise...as usual.
When Shadow opened the door, they found themselves looking down a long hallway with a strangely large amount of white. The white was not the walls, but at least ten stormtroopers aiming rifles at the door. Behind them, was the olive green of an Imperial Officer’s uniform. From that distance, they heard a haughty and far-too-proud-of-himself voice, “Move and die.”
[You think they’ll shoot us for breathing?] Shadow asked, mentally grinning in Akan’s direction. She really was enjoying the ability to share her wit with the universe...or rather, with Akan. He just ignored her and looked ahead to the troopers. He had an idea. It was basic, stupid, and if it worked would cause many good stories to tell over some Corellian Ale. Oh, why not?
Akan dove to the door. No, he dove to the side of the door. At that moment, the stormtroopers opened fire, blaster shots from the rifles streaking in towards the open door. Suddenly, though, the door was no long open. Sounds of the bolts hitting the now-closed door rang out. Akan looked to the other two, grinning with his hand on the door switch. Both of them were giving him a look that showed they, too, were ready to fall to the floor laughing. He took this time to shrug, “I don’t think they’ll just stand there and shoot at the door. And I don’t think that trick will work again. Um...probably should get some cover and wait for them.”
Jen nodded and moved around behind one of the large desks on the opposite side of the room from the door. She had her small blaster pistol drawn and rested it over the desk, waiting. Akan knew that his lightsaber would most likely cause more annoyance in such a tight situation, so he moved back next to Jen and got out his own blaster. While Shadow did have a blaster pistol, she had decided long ago that it wasn’t as useful a weapon as she was. So, she stood on the left wall next to the door. Her vibroblade was drawn and ready, and on her free hand her claws were extended.
They all listened(though Shadow and Akan had better ears and could therefore hear it much more clearly) as the troopers came up to the door and prepared themselves. There was the usual long pause where both sides were obviously trying to either outwit the others or just weren’t sure if they were doing the right thing. Then, the door slid open. Akan and Jen didn’t even wait to see if anyone was in front, and both pulled the triggers on their blasters, letting out a volley of red shots. At the same time, the stormtroopers had obviously had the same plan. Shots streaked inwards, impacting against the wall behind them, the floor, and the computers. Some got close, but both sides were just shooting blind because of the wall of red that had developed from all the shooting. Then they saw a small concussion grenade roll into the room. That was not good.
Somehow, between the volleys of blaster fire, Shadow managed to roll through, pick up the grenade, and toss it back before getting to more cover. The only drawback to this was singed tail-fur. And while this was a horrible fate, indeed, it could have been much much worse. There was a short pause in the blaster fire as the stormtroopers scattered from the grenade. Akan caught sight of three of them being taken down from shots that he and Jen were still sending, then there was a flash and a loud explosion. His ears flattened against his head and he couldn’t help but whimper slightly at the noise. No shots were came back at them. Carefully, Akan got up and looked through the clearing smoke. Well, that was quick work.
A single blaster shot suddenly rang through the corridor. Akan started to move, but was moving too late. It caught him hard in the chest, sending him to the floor on his back. Jen quickly responded with a few shots from her small pistol, and she watched the Officer who had fired on Akan drop after taking at least one shot to the face. She then looked and saw Akan on the ground groaning painfully. Strangely, she noticed Shadow was cringing too.
Before Jen could ask why, Shadow quickly moved over to Akan and said tiredly, “New lesson for you. Think about the wound closing...think about it. Let it happen. Your body should know what to do.”
Akan whimpered and found the pain hard to think through. However, he managed to and found the burn mark on his chest faded(well, on his skin at least, the brown jacket was still blackened). The pain faded, and Akan looked up at her with an amazed face that was shared by Jen. Shadow half grinned, “Complete morphing is hard to do without training...but simple things like that are normal. You just have to focus enough.”
“Uh-huh...” Akan mumbled, getting up as best he could, “Still burns...”
“It should fade,” Shadow said as she moved to look down the corridor that was littered with bodies and debris from the explosion. She turned back to the other two and motioned down the corridor, “We need to keep moving.”
Jen was helping Akan up, and as they started down the corridor, asked quietly, “You...um...okay?”
Akan managed a slow nod, “Yeah...well, physically. Mentally I could have sworn that what just happened couldn’t have happened.”
“I know what you mean,” Jen said with a slight grin.
“We took the wrong left,” Jen said flatly, standing with the other two in a small room that was once most likely a closet.
“How could we have taken the wrong left?!” Akan growled, having had this argument when they’d past two left corridors that were right next to each other. He and Shadow had said one way felt right, but Jen had insisted on the other. By rule of voting(and the fact that Shadow and Akan were bigger, stronger, and didn’t like being wrong or lost) they went with Akan and Shadow’s way. This, after many turns, led them to three small offices that were empty, and the closet.
“Obviously you two were wrong!” Jen said harshly, turning and starting back the way they’d come.
Akan grumbled something under his breath and stalked after her. Then he realized Shadow hadn’t followed, “Hold on...where’s Shady?”
Shady? Ah, why not. Jen seemed to take notice of the name and instead stopped and looked around. The two of them searched some, and Akan found that he could feel Shadow’s mind but she was...he couldn’t figure out where exactly she was. Then, from the back of the closet, a door slid open to a turbolift. Within it, was Shadow, a huge grin on her face an standing with her hands on her hips, “You two coming or not?”
Akan managed a ‘hah, I was right’ noise and strutted back to the turbolift. Jen didn’t care as much about being right as the other two, and simply followed, not bringing it up so as not to encourage the two of them. They were like children. Very annoying children that made you wonder why the parents had let them live more than three months. Once in the turbolift, the door closed and it started down. They didn’t seem to have much control where it went, but assumed it simply only went to one place.
The turbolift stopped, and Akan stepped in the front. Shadow stood behind him, and next to her, Jen had readied her blaster pistol. The door slid open, and they found themselves looking into a large, circular room. There was an outer section around it, with the inner section separated by pillars and a few computer consoles. It was a strangely disturbing design, and the soft red lighting didn’t help at all. Seeing no one, Akan carefully stepped into the room, moving to the side to see into around a pillar and into the center.
It was worrying. Everything felt wrong. The Force itself was oppressive. The center of the inner section of the room held a slightly raised section on the floor, and on that was a large metal sheet. It was humanoid shaped, and had obviously held someone. Torture? Maybe, but there was no other evidence. It looked more like some form of a prison complex. Very high security. Akan took another small step, and then noted that there were restraints on the metal. They were broken.
[Something is watching us...] Shadow ‘said’ in a strangely quiet voice in his mind.
Akan nodded slowly, and took one more step, nearing the center section. [Keep Jen in the turbolift if you can.]
Then a smell started to rise. A strong one. Something he knew but didn’t know...his nose was obviously more sensitive than before, and he knew what this was but couldn’t seem to put a name to it. [I smell fresh blood...] Shadow answered his thoughts. This was confirmed by a small amount of blood he could see on the floor. Fresh was right.
As Akan took another step, this time pacing him at the edge of the center of the room, he got the lightsaber off of his belt. Everything in him was telling him something was very wrong about this place. Shadow was right...something was watching. But something else was there. Something searching their minds. But Akan could see nothing. But other senses were more acute in this body...
His ear suddenly caught a sound off to the far left. Quiet, but as he heard the noise of metal being torn from something else, the Force sent a quick, almost violent warning. Akan reacted without thinking, finding himself spinning towards the sound and activating his lightsaber. The snap-hiss echoed throughout the disturbingly quiet room, and the second that he had gotten the blue-green blade into the usual defensive position in front of him, a large sheet of metal(most likely from the wall) was sliced cleanly in two and fell past him
Recovering from the shock, Akan was suddenly hit by a strong fist. It wasn’t physical. It was the Force itself. He grunted painfully as he slammed into him like a wall strapped to a landspeeder, sending him into one of the pillars hard, and then to the ground. He could hear Shadow whimper from the pain, but then he heard a noise he hadn’t expected.
Jen yelled out, “SHADOW!”
Akan felt Shadow’s movements distantly, turning to react to a threat that Jen had seen. Suddenly, a wave of pain shot through Akan from his head. He felt like passing out, but managed to stay conscious. Shadow didn’t. He heard her thud as she slammed into the floor Akan’s head was spinning as he heard Jen yell something else, then another loud thud. In blurred vision, he saw a dark cloaked figure move into the turbolift. It was holding...Shadow. He could tell because his arm ached from the way she was being dragged. Jen had been thrown out of the turbolift, and he could see her just barely, crumbled on the ground against a pillar.
Before he could do anything, the turbolift door closed. He heard it leave. Whoever it was had gone, and taken Shadow with him. Starting to get up to go after them, Akan suddenly realized he still could feel the same person watching him. The attacker wasn’t the one watching them? Or rather...he was better at hiding. On his feet again, Akan got his lightsaber up in front of him and carefully looked around the room. He could...hear breathing. It was Jen’s though. If there was someone else, he couldn’t tell beyond the feeling through the Force.
Slowly, his brain came to the conclusion that there was only one way to do this. It was stupid and simple. For some reason, he grinned and then just said, “I know someone’s there...come out.”
He heard movement from the right side. Quickly, Akan turned and faced that direction to show he could tell where the other was. Then, from a section in the wall, he saw a humanoid figure step out. The figure was a little taller than he was, and was wearing a very clean cut uniform. In the red light, it took a moment for Akan to realize it was the olive green of an Imperial Officer. But something...Akan could feel the man strongly in the Force. A voice spoke, sharp and obviously that of a man in the military, “You’re a Jedi.”
Akan forced back a grin. Same old answer wouldn’t work in a stand off, so he held his stance, “Yes. Who was that?”
“His name is Sadrak,” the voice responded flatly.
Something was still bothering Akan. He put his finger on it, and asked, “You were hiding from him?”
“He would have found me if not for you,” the voice sounded strangely happy. When the man took a step forward into clearer light, Akan saw the face of a seasoned warrior. He wasn’t old, but had the look of a man fighting all his life. He didn’t look like the average Officer who was there because of family connections and wealth. This man showed in his stature that he had earned his position. It seemed that the man got a clearer view of Akan, too, as a look of surprised washed over the Imperial’s face, “Alrax...”
“You know what I am?” Akan asked, for some reason lowering his lightsaber slightly and looking just as surprised. Somehow, he didn’t notice the fact that he’d truly accepted no longer being human so easily.
The surprise left the Imperial’s face, and it became one of determination. He looked to his left, and extended an arm. Akan watched suddenly as a small object shot towards the Imperial’s hand. The Force. That couldn’t be good...and that object...
With the small object in his hands, the Imperial started moving forward. A moment later, the object was easily identified by a snap-hiss and a blade of pale orange light extending from it. Akan quickly brought his lightsaber up and caught the Imperial’s blade high. How did he have a lightsaber?!
The two of them stood there, blades locked high for what seemed like an eternity. They were studying the other’s features. Reading. Learning. And the Imperial seemed amazed to at what he was seeing. Suddenly, he pulled back from the deadlock and brought a swing to Akan’s right side. Akan parried the blade and countered with an attack of his own aimed at the man’s legs. The Imperial jumped over the sweeping blue-green blade and landed a few meters away. He gave no time for Akan to recover, diving in with the blade swinging up. Again, Akan parried the attack, but found himself having to step back as the Imperial swung the lightsaber more frantically and dangerously. Each time, Akan had managed to get his blade in the right place just in time, but it wasn’t going to stay that way forever.
Yet again, a stupid idea came to mind. Two so far had worked. So he’d try his luck with a third. As the Imperial’s orange blade swung in from the left at neck level, Akan brought his blade into a position to parry it easily. But the second before they made contact, he deactivated his own lightsaber and ducked. Pulled around by the momentum of the swing, the Imperial was left open for a half second. Just long enough for Akan to punch him hard in the stomach. The man stumbled back after losing his breath, and Akan gave him no chance to attack again. With the Imperial’s lightsaber off to the side in a horrible position for defense, Akan planted a strong punch to the man’s face.
He was sent sprawling against the center of the circular room. The lightsaber fell out of his hand and rolled to the other side. Akan had started to move to get in the way, but the Imperial wasn’t moving anymore. Unconscious. Akan let out a long sigh of relief and put his lightsaber on his belt as he went to Jen. Yet again, that was a fight he shouldn’t have been able to win. Last time he’d been involved in one of those, Shadow had killed him. This time...this time he’d pulled a cheap trick to stay alive.
Whatever works was not the motto of most Jedi, but then again, Akan was not exactly the most exemplary example of a Jedi. Getting over to Jen, he knelt down beside her and helped her to sit up. She was conscious and a little dazed, but thanked him and told him what happened. He had seen it(and felt it) enough to not need the reminder, but let her speak it anyway. Once she’d finished, he explained the later half of the encounter.
Doing her usual ‘are you alright’ drilling of questions at him, Jen looked to the body of the Imperial, “What do we do?”
Akan sighed heavily and helped Jen to get to her feet, “We put him in the cargo compartment like that last one. Then we get Shadow.”
“But what if...” Jen started to say something, but Akan cut her off.
“If she dies, you’ll know. I’ll die too,” he had said it sharply and almost bitterly as he walked over to get the Imperial, “But she’s...distant. Moving away. Far away,” once he’d lifted up the Imperial and gotten the man’s lightsaber(can’t just leave those lying around), he looked up to the ceiling, “She’s already off the planet.”
“I...” Jen was probably about to apologize, though she wasn’t all that sure why. Instead, she stopped herself and got the turbolift open.
“We’ll get her back,” Akan said strongly as he stepped into the turbolift with her, “And I’ve got the feeling we have the key to tracking whoever took her down in this man.”
Problems started quickly, once they’d arrived aboard the Republic Nebulon-B Frigate that was to get them out of Naboo and back to the Claw. The troubles centered around the Imperial Akan had stuffed into the cargo compartment(amazing how much use that was getting). The Republic wanted to keep him for interrogation, and no matter what Akan said, they wouldn’t let him in to talk. Akan had thought to try pulling ‘rank’ on them, but the problem that he’d left long ago(and under a different name) was quickly dwarfed by the fact that he was a species none of them had seen before. If that didn’t kill a lie, nothing would, because Alraxians were easy to notice. Especially since(as far as Akan knew) there were only two of them.
Two...Shadow. He had to find her. Not just out of the selfish reason of continuing to live, but...she was his partner. They did work well together. And she was...a good friend despite the fact that they’d only known each other for a short time. They had ‘talked’ through the Link a good amount, learning about each other and truly becoming friends. And now...she was gone. Part of him felt like it was his fault. He’d lost Mare years before, and now...another. But Shadow wasn’t dead.
Jen put a hand on his shoulder, noticing the expression on his face, “You said it yourself...we’ll get her back.”
“Yeah...” Akan said, looking around the small tapcafe within the frigate, “But I can’t...I can’t feel her there anymore. Or rather, she’s distant. Too distant. I don’t think she’s conscious either.”
“Its only been a few hours,” Jen said, trying to be helpful and feeling a little more than useless, “Whoever took her can’t have gotten too far away.”
Akan nodded, but didn’t believe it for a second, “We’ll never find her without the Imperial. I thought about that place down there...and started to wonder. What if that Imperial we brought back was the one held in that room?”
Jen raised an eyebrow, “What do you mean? I would think it was the person who got away with Shadow.”
Shaking his head, Akan closed his eyes to remember it, “He told me he was hiding from the other. And I got a look at his wrists before getting him out of the Y-Wing. Burned. Ankles are probably the same.”
Slowly, Jen’s face started to show her realization of what Akan was saying, “You mean...that you think that entire garrison was just to hold one man?”
‘I’ve seen the Empire do crazier things,” Akan said shrugging, “And it all fits.”
“No,” Jen ran a hand through her hair, “No it doesn’t. Why did he attack you if he was the one being held?”
Alright, so Akan hadn’t thought that far. He shrugged again, looking down to the table, “I don’t know...but he looked like he wasn’t going to attack me until he saw who...wait, no...what I am.”
“The lightsaber does attract attention,” Jen said with a grin on her face.
“No, I mean me,” he pointed to himself, “He mentioned Jedi, but it was how I looked that seemed to set him off.”
“Strange,” Jen admitted.
Akan sighed and thought of his next words carefully. When he spoke, he kept his voice low, “The only way to find Shadow is to talk with that Imperial. The Republic isn’t going to let us talk with him...so...”
Jen’s eyes widened slightly, and she suddenly lowered her voice too, “You can’t break him out! I mean...well, even if you could, you’d have the New Republic on your tail everywhere!”
“It’s the only way,” Akan said with a slow nod, “They’ll just take him off somewhere and he’ll rot in a Republic cell. There’s something about that Imperial...he knows something.”
“You’re insane,” Jen said, again grinning a little.
“And you’re going to help me,” Akan said with a short laugh.
So, they were going to break an Imperial Officer held in a high security cell within a Republic Frigate out. Then, they were going to fly away, and hope to the Force that Akan was right. This would mean not going back to the Claw, though...it would endanger them if he tried to get back there. On his own. No. On their own. He and Jen would do this...and hopefully this Imperial would shed some light onto what was going on without attempting to kill Akan again.
A foolish hope, probably, but without hope, life got depressing fast.
Jen had complained at him for five minutes. She was going to go along with this, of course, but wanted to make it very clear that she thought Akan was being a complete idiot. He understood this, and was trying to alleviate her fears. Most of them along the lines of ‘we’ll get shot’. In fact, all of them. Some involved getting shot later...but still, that was getting shot nonetheless.
The Frigate had just left hyperspace and was finishing up the transfer of Ansion’s personnel over to the Claw. Akan figured this was about the right time, so he and Jen were walking down the long corridor to the ‘cell’ where the Imperial was being kept. It wasn’t as much a cell, rather a well guarded small room. Technically, well guarded meant two armed men at the door. This was really only to prevent the Imperial from leaving. No one could possibly be stupid enough to attempt to break him out.
No one, except Akan Ta...BlueIce. As they approached the door, Akan was glad to see that the only others visible in the corridor were the two guards. They wore simple vests and held large blaster pistols. Whatever conversation the two of them were having quickly stopped as they noticed he and Jen. Once he got close enough, Akan stepped over to the guard on the far side. Jen knew the plan. Hopefully she’d stick to it...
“Mind if I talk to the guy in there?” Akan asked innocently.
Both guards gave him one of those ‘are you stupid?’ looks that would have made Akan smile if he was as stupid as they seemed to think. The guard he stood in front of spoke flatly, “Not unless you’ve got some authorization.”
“Oh,” Akan smiled suddenly, “Good! I’ve got some right here.”
He then drew his blaster pistol fired a stun bolt at the guard. The blue rings covered the guard and he collapsed to the floor. At the same time, the other guard was drawing his weapon and opening his mouth to call for help. It was cut off by another stun bolt. This one from Jen’s blaster. Akan couldn’t help a smile as the second guard fell, “Thank you.”
“Lets get this over with,” she said, putting the blaster away. Akan nodded and knelt next to one of the guards. He shuffled trough the man’s chest pocket and pulled out a small card. It should unlock the door from the inside. When Akan stood up, Jen was reaching over and hit the switch to open the door. It slid open and revealed a room just barely larger than a storage closet. There was a small cot, and a desk that looked like it had been put together by Ewoks.
Sitting on the cot, the Imperial turned his head tiredly and gave them a slow look. He’d been about to say something then realized who was standing there. His mouth reformed new words, “You...”
“Listen,” Akan raised his hands to show he wasn’t going to attack, “You know where that man went with my friend?”
The Imperial nodded after a moment. His eyes widened slightly as realization dawned on him, “You’re breaking me out?”
“Only if you’ll help me,” said Akan, glancing back down the corridor and seeing no one still, “But you have to decide now. Don’t even think of betraying me, because she,” he nodded to Jen, who smiled to the Imperial, “She will shoot you. Are you in?”
The Imperial took no time to think about it. He nodded and started to get up, but Akan put up a hand to stop him and kicked in one of the guards, “Put on that. They’ll figure out you’re gone quickly, but that’ll at least give us some time.”
The man nodded and Jen and Akan waited. When the door closed again, Jen was grinning. Akan knew why. She might shoot that man, but not in the way Akan had threatened. It would be a stun shot. If it was normal bolt, it would be aimed at his foot and probably miss anyway.
“You realize that was the oldest line in the galaxy, don’t you?” Jen asked. Huh? What was she talking about?
“What do you mean?” Akan asked, genuinely confused. So maybe he was wrong in what she was grinning about.
She laughed and did her best imitation of Akan’s voice, “Good! I’ve got it right here.”
Akan couldn’t help but smile at that, shaking his head and shrugging, “He left it wide open. I had to. It was just too tempting to not say that.”
Jen was about to say something when the door opened and the Imperial stepped out wearing the guard’s uniform. In his hands was his olive green officer’s uniform. Akan sighed, but just told the man to hide it as best he could. They then made their way to the hangar. Once there, they had to explain that there were some things that the Imperial had that were left in the Y-Wing, and that’s why the guard was with them. Akan was going to give him the things before they left. Thankfully, it had worked and the hangar itself was fairly empty. The Y-Wing was also in an out of the way section that would provide at least some cover.
Suddenly, Akan winced. He’d forgotten to tell the Imperial an important detail. Carefully, he said over his shoulder, “Forgot to tell you something...important...”
“I don’t like this,” he responded slowly.
Akan grinned nervously, “We have a Y-Wing...and there’s not enough room...you’ll have to uh...ride in the cargo section.”
“What?!” thankfully, he kept his voice low with that one.
“We can turn around now and go back if you want,” Jen said before Akan knew how to respond. Whew. At least one of them was a quick thinker.
They walked around to the Y-Wing, and Akan moved to get the cargo compartment open, “Its cramped but we’ll take a short jump and then find a better ride.”
With a heavy sigh, the Imperial stepped over and climbed in the very small, cramped space. His last words were, “I’ve killed men for less than this.”
Then, Akan closed it and grimaced. Jen smiled and patted his shoulder, “That went well.”
They climbed up and got into the Y-Wing, getting clearance from the docking control to leave. He did not, however, contact the Claw. As they started to leave the small hangar of the frigate, Jen was preparing jump coordinates to a nearby system. Hopefully it wasn’t too long, because an irrate Imperial Officer like that man was not something Akan wanted to deal with after being cramped in the cockpit. There was something ironic in that, but he ignored it.
Just as the Y-Wing was pulling out of the hangar, the comm beeped and a voice came on, “Y-Wing! Return to the Frigate immediately!!”
“Great, they caught on already,” Akan cursed and quickly set the engines to full throttle, diverting as much as he could from the weapons systems. They rocketed out into space and Akan quickly started weaving as he knew they’d try to get a tractor beam lock on them. He glanced over his shoulder to Jen, “Get those coords quickly!”
“Power down your engines!” the voice called out over the comm, “If you do not comply we will be forced to fire.”
Yeah, yeah. They were always ‘forced’ to fire. On the HUD, a set of coordinates and a bearing appeared. Good, Jen had gotten it done. He started pulling the Y-Wing around when the frigate below lit up. Bright red blasts of energy shot up at them. That was not good. Nebulon-Bs, like Lancer Frigates, had been designed by the Empire as anti-starfighter ships. Their targeting systems were specifically designed to target small, faster ships. Y-Wings weren’t exactly the fastest, but a frigate like the one below them was better at aiming at such a ship than say, a Star Destroyer. A few shots missed, but suddenly the ship rocked violently. Akan cursed and called back to Jen, “Shields are out! Hitting it now...”
As he reached for the hyperspace lever, another of the frigate’s laser cannons fired and scored a hit. Where exactly the hit landed, Akan didn’t know, but there was a loud explosion, frying of systems within the cockpit, and they started to roll. The biggest problem was that Akan was already pulling the hyperspace lever...and from what happened next, he knew the system wasn’t damaged.
The stars extended, and they shot out into hyperspace. Except the roll had pulled them into a different bearing. Akan had no idea where they were going. Jen had cried out but a sudden silence engulfed the cockpit as they both realized the danger of what had just happened. Neither even thought about the fact that the Imperial in the cargo compartment(which was on the underbelly of the cockpit) could be dead. What worried them was that they were blindly flying through hyperspace. They could easily fly through a star, planet, or some object.
In a disturbingly calm voice, Jen said, “I’ll...try to figure out our trajectory...”
“Yeah...” Akan said with a slow nod as he went to figuring out the extent of the damage...not that it would matter if they didn’t make it out of hyperspace, “Yeah, you do that.”
“Pull us out of hyperspace in two minutes...” Jen said quietly, that eerie calm still consuming the cockpit, “Should come out in open space...then make another jump to any place near.”
“Right...” Akan was feeling slightly worried still, but they hadn’t died yet, and it’d been five long minutes, “At least we know the hyperdrive isn’t damaged. But I think the sublight engines are dead, if not on their last life. We’ll find out the hard way. Hopefully that’s the only trouble.”
They were silent after that, and Akan simply watched the chrono counting down. He shifted slightly in the seat, moving his tail out of the way again. Why did it have to be so damned sensitive, anyway?! One day he’d have to actually take time to figure out small details like that, as they continually drove him crazy. Somehow, though, he doubted he’d get the time to do that for a while now.
The chrono was nearing zero, and Akan glanced over his shoulder to Jen. Neither of them were going to say goodbyes or similar, but they were thinking it. If Jen’s calculations were wrong, they could easily revert to realspace through a star, or worse. And there was a good chance she was wrong, as there had only been a short second between being shot off course and the jump to lightspeed. The navcomputer had fried itself trying to comprehend what had happened, and that helped even less. Part of him wanted to close his eyes when he reached to the lever, but Akan wanted to see what appeared in front of them, even if only for a split second.
The chrono reach zero. Slowly, Akan pulled the hyperspace levers back. The blue tunnel around them faded, and the stars reverted back to their places. The ship shook violently, but beyond that...Jen had been right. Deep space, no planets, or objects around. Both of them let out long sighs of relief, and Akan quickly went to rechecking the damage. Sublight engines were at half power. The hit was low on the deflector shield(which had already been taken out), so now there wasn’t even a chance of the shield being able to recharge.
As he did his best to reroute a little more power to the engines, he heard Jen’s voice, “We’re somewhere out beyond the sector and close to...Malastare.”
“Malastare, eh?” Akan thought about it a moment, then couldn’t help a smile, “Right near the Hydian Way...can you plot us a course there and then along to...I dunno, isn’t Sluis Van down that direction?”
There was a moment where Jen was going over maps, “Yes...we’ll have to make a couple jumps though. Sluis Van’s on the Rimma Trade Route. You sure about that, though? Isn’t Sluis Van occupied by the Empire?”
“What isn’t these das?” he replied, turning the Y-Wing towards the bearing that the navcomputer was starting to feed to the HUD, “At least there we can be fairly sure of getting a new ship. Can probably get some average money for this old piece of junk.”
The journey was fairly long, but thankfully travel across hyperspace routes was faster than trying to make your own. Akan had slept, and figured that Jen had done the same. He awoke to the beeping of the navcomputer and reverted the ship to realspace. A fair distance away was the large pale blue of the planet Sluis Van. A few grey marks could be seen orbiting the planet. The shipyards...Imperial shipyards. Thankfully, the entire planet wasn’t covered in troops. After convincing the docking authority in one of the smaller merchant cities that they were having engine trouble(which was true), that they were just planning to stay a short time(another truth), that they were also in the market for a new ship(three truths), and they wouldn’t cause any trouble(Akan didn’t believe this one himself), they were given clearance to land.
The nice part about the docks was that each ship had a nice, large area that could locked. The problem with this was that the man who’d approached them at the docks wanted a lot of money for it. Akan had given in, too exhausted to concentrate and use the Force to convince the man to be a little more friendly, and just paid him the extra hundred credits for the lock code. Once that was done, Akan locked the door as Jen got the poor Imperial out of the cargo compartment.
The man fell out cursing. You couldn’t blame him, really. Jen explained what had happened when he had tried yelling and cursing more, and eventually he calmed down. Though he had no weapon, Akan was still worried about this Imperial. It was in the eyes and the way he stood. Dangerous. His last encounter with this man did nothing but help the ‘dangerous’ feeling.
“Captain Titus Voort,” the Imperial said when asked his name. Funnily enough, Akan didn’t care, it was Jen who’d asked it. Akan would have been happy calling him scum, sithspawn, or any number of colorful names that seemed to fit the mane very well.
“Alright, Voort,” Akan said stepping over and leaning against the Y-Wing, “We just finished our end of the deal. Now your turn. I think my questions can be summed up simply. What the Sith was going on at Naboo and where did that freak take my friend?!”
Akan was getting annoyed more, because he knew he should be able to still feel Shadow there. Somehow, though, he couldn’t. Shadow had explained the distance didn’t matter with their Link. It would always be there and always be very strong. But why was it silent? She couldn’t still be unconscious. She couldn’t be dead. Then what could she be? He sighed and just looked to the Voort to answer.
Voort had obviously been thinking about what to say, when realization came over him, “Ah ha! Thought I recognized you. You’re a little taller, but I’d know that anywhere!”
That what? Akan glanced at where the Imperial was pointing. He was pointing to Akan’s shoulder, with the burn mark from the blaster shot that had hit him on Endor. Why would he be...? Realization then his Akan, “You’re the one that shot me?!”
“Would have killed you, too,” Voort went on with a shrug, “Shot got glanced off by something.”
Akan had the look that Jen was quickly learning to recognize. He was going to kill this Voort. It was in the glare, and the flattening of the ears. She put her hand up, “Look, let’s just get to business, okay?’
Somehow, that calmed Akan some. His tail still swished across the ground slightly, and his ears were still mostly flat, but he didn’t look ready to pounce and maul anymore. Voort couldn’t help an almost cruel smile and said, “Sadrak would have taken her to his secondary base. It was where he was going to take me. I believe its somewhere out in the Garek system not far from the Corporate Sector.”
That was too easy. Far too easy. Akan raised an eyebrow, “You’re so open. Why is that, Imperial?” he said the last word slowly and as if it were the worst curse in the books. In his mind, it sure was up there.
Voort shot him a venomous look for only a short second, “I want him dead. And I always keep my word. Now, our deal is finished.”
The Force suddenly went crazy. Akan glanced to his left, where the warning had come from, and then realized that there was one very large piece of the wall flying at he and Jen. He dove to the ground, pulling Jen down with him and it slammed into the Y-Wing. Great, that’ll take at least another hundred credits off the worth. It would probably fetch barely enough to get a used blaster, by now.
Akan was getting up and starting towards Voort, who had began running to the door. He reached for his blaster, and aimed to the Imperial, but was suddenly hit in the back of his head with another piece of dock. Akan fell face first into the metal ground of the dock. Before he blacked out, he caught sight of Voort moving back their direction. He also remembered why he never liked or trusted any Imperials. Especially ones that were so willing to ‘help’.
DethStryke 
I've got a good amount of time on my hands, so I usually end up just writing one part at a time, then post it. Probably should start on tommorrows(wait, its 12AM...), err, today's soon.
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