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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ankh-Morpork Guard" data-source="post: 4010300" data-attributes="member: 10079">Chapter 557: MonstersThe tall, red grass of Rodia’s moon seemed to stretch forever. Adria had been tracking the odd signal for the last twenty standard minutes according to her chrono. Every time a coralskipper or other Vong ship went overhead, she’d ducked low and just waited, not moving for minutes just to be safe. It was why she hadn’t actually moved too terribly far in twenty minutes.    Glancing over her shoulder, she couldn’t see the natural shelter anymore. There were others like it all over, which made Adria wonder just how natural they were. It didn’t seem impossible for the collections of large rocks to actually have been built by Rodians as makeshift shelters for...for...whatever reason. She knew next to nothing about their culture beyond the fact that it was clan based and put a strong emphasis on ‘the hunt’.    Knelt down to make herself harder to see, Adria looked at the scanning device again. About a half kilometer north was where the signal was strongest. In fact, it was close enough she could probably get a visual on it if she tried...    Adria was impulsive, but she wasn’t stupid. She would check out the area, then immediately head back to where Rea was holed up. She wasn’t about to get herself killed, but at the same time, sitting around waiting to do something like this seemed foolish. It was likely that Commodore Nok would have them doing this when he was conscious again, anyway, so might as well get a step ahead.    After sliding the scanner back into her pack and sealing it again, Adria looked overhead again before beginning to move again. She stayed low, weary of Vong ships that may pass overhead. Earlier that day, she’d watched the entire moon erupt in Coralskippers. But now...since they’d ‘landed’ on the surface, they hadn’t actually seen any Vong. Sure, they’d been followed and managed to escape, and there were ships passing overhead here and there but no direct contact. No direct contact on a moon that was obviously heavily occupied.    Where were the Vong?    A few minutes passed before Adria saw something that was definitely not rocks. In fact, from the way the light was catching it, it looked to be metal...    Moving carefully and staying low, Adria made sure to keep her blaster in hand and ready. There was no cover nearby and so it was just a long stretch of red grass between her and what looked like a circular building with a flat roof. And it was definitely a metal structure, which meant it wasn’t Vong in origin...which raised more questions...which...    All thoughts were suddenly cut off by a sound that Adria had never heard before. It was like the roar of a great beast, but twisted and alien and with an odd shriek in the bestial sound that sent a shiver up her spine. And it was behind her.    Her head spun around to find the source of the noise and Adria saw a creature...no, two creatures. Both of them were a good three and a half meters high, walking on four spined, crab-like legs, with a builky, but more humanoid-shaped torso curving up above the lower section of the body. Between two human-sized scythe-shaped arms was something recognizable. The head of the creature was that of a Rodian, with a distinctive snout, large black eyes, and even the two stalked ears...but on the back of its head, instead the usual ‘spines’ that dotted a Rodian’s skull were huge, very dangerous looking quills.    One of the two creatures roared again, its snout-shaped mouth opening wide to let out the spine-chilling sound, and then began to move quickly for her. How Adria hadn’t seen them behind her before was beyond her, but that didn’t matter.    Instinct kicked in just as the second Rodian-thing began to come after her, and Adria raised her blaster to fire a barrage of shots while starting to run the other direction at a speed that would not be fast enough to keep her away from the two monsters for long. Though most of her shots went wide, one did strike the creatures at the front right in its massive chest, but had no effect on it other than to leave a black mark on its armoured torso.    Seeing how ineffective her blaster pistol was against the hulking beasts charging straight for her, Adria decided not to waste her time staring over her shoulder. Instead, she turned completely forward and ran as fast as she could, hoping to hell that she could get on the roof of that building and that the creatures wouldn’t be able to get up to her before she figured out what to do.    In a matter of seconds, she could feel the ground shaking behind her as the two creatures gained rapidly. It was almost enough to cause Adria to lose her footing, and she couldn’t help but glance over her shoulder. What she saw was one of the creatures within arm’s reach of her, barreling forward with one of its massive, bone-bladed arms already coming down to cleave her in two.    In that moment of near panic, Adria made a decision, and dove to the side. She hit the ground hard, rolling in time to see the first creature pull itself to a stop before spinning around awkwardly on its four legs to come at her again, while the second creature was now about to hit her dead on.    Before she could even come with the faintest of ideas on how to survive the encounter with the two beasts, a new sound took over. Or rather, a series of them. A barrage of blaster bolts arced across Adria’s field of vision before catching both of the monstrous creatures all over their torso. The amount of shots stalled the both of them until finally they dropped hard to the ground, the one still charging for Adria hitting hard and sliding through the dirt before it came to a stop.    It took Adria a few moments of sitting on her backside, staring at the two downed, slightly-moving monsters, before she finally turned towards the source of the blaster fire. A part of her expected to see the other members of Zephyr squadron that they hadn’t run into yet, but that wasn’t what Adria’s eyes found. She saw two humans, about five Rodians, and a Mon Calamari, all armed with blaster rifles of various make and moving towards her with them lowered.    One of the humans, a young man with short, blonde hair, extended a hand to help her to her feet, “Smart move running this way. Wouldn’t have seen you otherwise.”    Adria did not take his hand, getting to her feet on her own and keeping her blaster in hand, just in case. She had been about to say something in response when she noticed something else. Or rather, someone.    “...Loro?!”    The Mon Calamari in the group pushed his way through a couple of the Rodians before his already-large eyes somehow managed to go wider, “Harken!”    “Loro, I thought you were dead!” she laughed without meaning to and then, also without meaning to, hugged her former wingmate.    Somewhat surprised and a bit uncomfortable, Loro managed to return the gesture and said in that gravely voice that was very much his, “They do equip starfighters with ejection seats.”    Realizing she’d hugged him, Adria nearly jumped back. She looked over the group, noticing they all looked as shocked at her as she was to find them. Which brought up a few important questions, “Hang on...I think you’re going to have to tell me how the hell you got here, what’s going on, and uh,” she motioned behind her with her blaster pistol, “What those are. Were.”    The other human, an older looking man with thinning hair but a strong build, nodded, “I believe we have a few questions for you, too, Miss. But lets talk inside where we have at least some shelter from those beasts.”</blockquote>

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