Alright...I haven't even proofed this fully, but I'll just edit in place... This was the official end of our Episode I. We completed about half of Episode II, and I'll write that up shortly. Thanks for the push to get this done. I felt kinda guilty not finishing at least what I promised. There's one more wrap-up scene, then it's on to II.
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As the Polestar breached the upper atmosphere of Benelli IV, lights began flashing
across the main control panels.
"We having incoming!" Toba yelled, swiveling to the targeting computer. "Two
fighters and a small transport."
"Can we catch a break, here?" Arani moaned, her maneuver sending the ship bouncing
across the thermosphere. "Rann, Sia! Man fire control!"
"I'm on it," Rann said calmly over the intercom.
"I have them," Sia said.
Two missiles streaked from the bottom of the ship, and then a loud clanking sound echoed through the ship. Toba cringed and checked the maintenance system.
"My launcher's dead," Sia said, frantically.
Arani looked at the Gungan with fire in her eyes.
"I using your friend's parts," Toba said, sheepishly. "Everything checking out. I
told you the dust would..."
"Save it," she growled.
"Locked on," Rann interrupted and a chain of missiles fired.
One of the fighters dissolved in a haze of superheated metal that the second fighter
split as it came in firing fast. The cockpit lights dimmed with every precision
strike. Overlapping alert klaxons followed. Arani barely avoided a collision with
the craft, as she cut the ship planetward in a sharp maneuver.
"We can't stand against this with one launcher," she said. "We'll have to hide
somewhere on the planet."
Suddenly a massive concussion rocked the ship and the shield alarm wailed.
"Sheilds down!" Toba called. "Ion blast taking out the generator."
A handful of concussions followed, and the entire cockpit went black. Sia was at the
cockpit portal instantly.
"The blasts came from that transport," she said, breathless.
"No kidding," Arani shouted, slamming her headset into the dead control panel.
The sleek little fighter glided by the disabled ship, the Quarren pilot gesturing at
them derisively. They could only watch as the transport moved into a docking
position.
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The docking hatch popped open and the pressure between the two ships equalized
violently. Toba shook his head, crouched inside the half-closed door of the lounge,
his blaster rifle pointed up at the gaping hatch.
"All aboard this ship stand where you can be seen and drop your weapons," an
amplified, metallic voice said.
"Hold steady," Toba heard Arani say from across the hall. "Wait until they come down."
"I surrender," she called, throwing a blaster pistol to where it could be seen from
the open hatch. She walked out into the hallway with her arms raised.
A helmeted head poked into the disabled ship, the pressure mask concealing the
creature inside.
"Where are the others?" the creature asked.
"I left them planetside," Arani said, lightly. "Couldn't pay for their passage out."
"Descant," the other said into his mic. "We only have one occupant....No, the pilot."
There was a long pause. The creature dropped into the ship with a heavy blaster
trained on Arani. He was followed by four companions, all Quarrens, by the shape of
their helmets.
The leader approached, snickering over his amplified communicator.
"You're going to take us back down and show us where you left them," he said.
"You can rot in the Core," Arani yelled jerking the blaster from her back holster
and firing into the creature's faceplate.
Behind the assailants, Rann and Sia leapt out into the cramped hallway, their
lightsabers swinging, as Toba popped out and fired. The leader of the thugs went
down with a wail, as his companions dove into open hatchways, returning fire.
Rann sliced one weapon apart and slashed the Quarren across the thigh, dodging wild
shots from his companions. Sia blocked a bolt into the deck and stepped under the
open hatch, preparing to do the same. Bright blue energy shot out from the open
hatch and she dropped, unconscious, as four more Quarrens leaped into the disabled
ship, cutting the downed Jedi off from here companions.
Rann charged them, but they were ready with long-handled stun batons. Two of the creatures slapped their batons on Rann's chest and he collapsed, a soundless scream on his lips.
"No!" Arani yelled. "Toba, light up those four!"
Toba stood and braced his heavy blaster against the wall, unleashing a hail of fire. Two of the Quarrens went down. Three others returned fire, while the last hoisted Sia-Lann's limp form over his shoulder and began climbing a rope ladder back to his ship. Without thinking, Toba charged, blasting two of the Quarrens, and smashing the third back with his shoulder. Wounds already scorched his glistening skin, oozing a thick orangish blood. Realizing that Arani was right behind him, he fired into the downed Quarren's chest and scampered up the ladder.
Something warned him, and he ducked back into the hatch as a massive plasteel axe slammed into the docking ring. Standing over the opening was the largest creature Toba had ever seen. Its thick matted hair wafted a foul stench and its massive wolf-like head leered. The Gungan swallowed hard and fired a blast into the thing's face, charging up the ladder and inside its long reach. The Yuzzem backhanded him across the docking bay and heaved the axe as he approached for the final stroke.
Toba crouched against a set of shipping containers, his ears still ringing from the strike. He pressed the firing stud on his blaster and heard the shrill tone of an empty energy cartridge. Throwing away the useless weapon, he struggled to rise, his vision goggling. The Yuzzem's grin was full of jagged teeth as he raised the axe, its blade humming certain death.
The blast was almost entirely absorbed by the massive creature, so that Toba did not even know the Yuzzem was dead until he collapsed, a blackened crater smoking in its hairy back. Arani stood with her head and shoulders out of the docking ring, her blasters already training into the hallway beyond.
"Come on, Gungan!" she snapped. "We got at least two more of these spitsnakes to take down."
The tink, tink, tink of an incoming grenade seemed to freeze both heroes, and then all was heat and movement. Toba, trying to slide between the heavy shipping crates, flew over them with the force of the blast, shrapnel peppering his mottled skin. Arani had disappeared in the explosion, and Toba, just regaining his senses, feared she was dead. A strained-metal creaking suddenly began and grew louder. The Gungan sat up, shaking off the effects of the grenade and the Yuzzem's attentions, realizing what was occuring. Already he could see the tell-tale signs of gas escaping around the blackened and twisted docking ring.
He leaped up and ran for the hallway where he'd seen Sia-Lann's captor disappear, only to run into the Quarren as he rushed to close and detach the docking hatch. The heavy Quarren scrambled to regain his feet, but Toba smashed him in the knee with a nearby hydrospanner, then brought the heavy metal tool down on the thug's head.
"Now to getting Sia," he said aloud.
"That won't be necessary, Gungan," a deep voice said from the end of the hallway.
A Duros, clad in a heavy armored space suit stood in the shadows, Sia-Lann clasped before him. His blaster lay against her temple.
"You being Descant?" Toba said, eyeing the docking bay with a sidelong glance. The Quarren's blaster pistol lay almost within reach.
"That's right little swamp frog," Descant said, his broad red eyes glowing. "You and your little crew are worth a lot. The rest of you are worth the same, dead or not, but this one..." He pressed the pistol against the unconscious Jedi's head. "She's worth ten times that alive."
"We having money, you know," Toba said, stepping forward.
"Not another step!" the Duros yelled, and Toba realized that not only was he not going to shoot Sia-Lann, Descant was also shaking with fear.
"You not shooting her, methinking," Toba said, giving one last look at the blaster.
"I can shoot you though!"
Toba's frog-like tongue shot out and stuck to the blaster pistol. Descant's shot went high, exploding on the roof above the Gungan's head, and he caught the pistol and fired.
The Duros dropped like a dead gundark. The strained metal behind him shrieking anew, Toba rushed to his fallen friend and slung her over his back. The hissing of the docking ring intensified, and as he reached it, he saw the first major breach. Calmly lowering Sia-Lan before him, he climbed down the ladder. He thumbed the docking hatch to the closed position, but all he heard was the strained sounds of broken machinery.
"No problemo," he said, rushing into the Polestar's docking bay.
He raked a mountain of junk off of a ladened worktable and lay the Jedi upon it, then began frantically searching through his junk boxes.
"Know it being here somewhere, and knowing I needed it," he mumbled.
The creaking and hissing of the two ships as they came apart intensified.
"Aha!" He held up a folded tarpualin. The light glimmered on its fine skein of plasteel fibers.
A dull whump sounded and Toba felt his ears pop. Rushing into the hallway, he unfolded the tarp, his ears already lifting into the air as the atmosphere in the Polestar rushed into space. He flung the tarp against the jagged edge of the docking ring and fitted the material into the hole, pushing it into the edges. The material became rigid where its surface met the void of space. As if on cue, Descant's ship broke away. Toba heard the superstructure drag against the top of the Polestar with a maddening scream of metal on metal. He cringed, hoping no other hull breaches occured. Satisfied with the sealer tarp, he sprayed the edges with additional sealant, and backed out of the docking tube.
He turned to see Arani, her face blackened and hair burned away, pushing herself up to a sitting position.
"What in the name of..." She ran her hands over her head. "Where's Sia?"
"She being in the cargo bay," Toba said. "I go seeing about power."
"Where's that freighter?" she said as he stepped over her.
He waved his hand vaguely in response, stomping toward the front of the ship.
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