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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ankh-Morpork Guard" data-source="post: 4162156" data-attributes="member: 10079">Chapter 574: Rescue“Don’t turn around, just run!” it was amazing that the usual gravely voice of the Mon Calamari, Obrack Loro, could transform into such a deep bellow when he was yelling.    Not that anyone was really going to argue with that.    Besides, before anyone had a chance to verbally respond, the young human bringing up the rear of their formation started to fire his blaster rifle. Next to Rea and helping with one of the three stretchers as they dashed for a small building that was just coming into sight, the older human did not listen to what Loro had said. At the sound of the blaster rifle, he looked over his shoulder and growled, “Val, quit standing there shooting at nothing! Come on!”    It was impossible for Rea not to risk a glance, and when she turned over her shoulder to see the young human male standing there, facing the other direction and holding his blaster rifle like a kid that had no idea how to aim. He turned, looking back to them and started to open his mouth to say something before the inevitable happened. In a flash of movement, a small black object cut through the meter and a half high, red grass before slicing across the young man’s neck.    There was a burst of a deeper red and no sound at all when he collapsed to the ground.    “No!” the old man stopped.    For the first time in her life, Rea found herself considering leaving someone behind to die. But no. No, he had to keep moving because one of the injured Zephyr pilots was on that stretcher just standing there with him!    “Take the Commander!” she snapped to Adria, who reacted before understanding and grabbed the other stretcher with a free hand while continuing on. The fiery haired woman was about to say something, but Rea turned around and sprinted back to the old man, who she could barely make out through the tall grass. And heading for him, she could see more movement in the sea of red. Grey forms moving quickly towards him, just like she’d encountered not long before. And then there was that thundering sound approaching rapidly...    Suddenly, the old man cried out in pain and Rea’s eyes caught a glimpse of a Chazrach pouncing onto him and driving a blade into his throat. She could also see the stretcher tip over and another Chazrach pounce the body that fell off. Another Zephyr dead...    Reason got the better of her all of a sudden, and Rea spun back around, lekku whipping through the grass around her at the sudden change in direction. As she charged after Loro and Adria, Rea was also intelligent enough to draw her blaster pistol. Glancing over her shoulder, she fired off a few quicky shots not aimed at any of the moving shapes in particular. She needed to keep her ears open for that buzzing sound just in case they had more razor bugs, too.    As she ran, Rea became more and more aware of that distant thundering. It wasn’t so distant anymore...in fact, the ground itself was shaking and...    When she glanced behind her again, Rea was shocked at the sight of a monstrous Vagh Rodiek bearing down on her, scythe like arm already swinging in a horizontal arc. As it was the first time she’d seen one of those monsters, her surprise was warranted, and luckily it didn’t impair her judgement. Immediately upon seeing what was happening, the Twi’lek dropped to the ground and rolled to the side, the huge crab-like legs of the monster charging past and continuing after Loro and Adria.    Why leave her behind? That seemed foolish...    Well, only for a moment.    When Rea managed to get back to her feet, she saw another of the creatures coming at her, easily visible through the red grass. Firing her blaster seemed useless against such a huge monster, but Rea squeezed off a series of shots anyway as she started to sprint away again, aware of the Chazrach coming after her, too. With about twenty meters between her and what she could see of the other Vagh Rodiek and how fast the thing seemed capable of moving, Rea knew she could only outrun it for another minute, at most.    Then, at just the right time, Rea heard the sound of a weapon firing that was not just a blaster rifle. The way the sound echoed more deeply indicated that it was a much heavier weapon, a blaster cannon, capable of taking down most speeders with a few shots.    Looking ahead of her again, she could see a tripod-mounted blaster cannon sitting on top of the not-so-distant building firing again and again. The Vagh Rodiek that had charged her first was dropped with a heavy thud after only three shots from the cannon, and immediately after Rea realized she wasn’t in the best position as its operators spun it to fire on the other monster...which was directly behind her and put her in the line of fire if they didn’t aim well, whoever they were.    But there were Chazrach flanking her now, moving in to cut her off so that the Vagh Rodiek behind would trample her in just a matter of seconds.    When the blaster cannon fired again, it went so close over her head that Rea swore she could feel the heat of the blaster bolt. There was a loud bellow from the monster behind her, but she didn’t bother to turn behind her to see where the thing had been hit. Another shot went much higher over her head, but was still terrifying, and when she heard the growl from the monster, Rea knew it could have only been meters behind her. But then there was a thud and she couldn’t feel the ground shaking behind her anymore.    There were shrieks from both sides as the Chazrach began to scatter, though when one came towards her, Rea had the foresight to put a blaster bolt into it before it could pounce. Just as she took the reptilian creature down, the grass dropped to a more reasonable heigh of knee level, and suddenly she could see Adria pushing the two stretchers into the building while Loro fired into the tall grass at Chazrach that were emerging with small amphistaves. On the building’s roof were five Rodians, one of them firing that blaster cannon almost blindly into the grass beyond while the other four were taking careful aim to pick off the Chazrach that were coming in from all sides.    “Move!” Loro was screaming at her as he put a blaster bolt into a Chazrach coming at Rea from the side. There were so damn many of them!    Hearing a buzzing sound suddenly, Rea dove to the ground again, but not before a sharp pain went up across her shoulder as the razor bug flew past. Somehow, though, she pulled herself up and kept moving, the Rodian’s above and Loro picking off any Chazrach that got close to her as she ran as fast as she could to the open doorway of the building.    It took only a few more seconds and she was in, tumbling into a table that was badly placed and then hitting the hard floor on her non-injured shoulder. Rea let out a groan of pain and turned to start firing out the door, but instead saw Loro slip inside and close the door before hitting a switch that would have sealed it. Yet, above, the Rodian’s weapons could still be heard firing.    Adria’s red-haired head suddenly came into view, “Are you alright?”    Sitting up as best she could and trying to wave off any help, Rea nodded. For some reason, however, she couldn’t find her voice. But despite her answer, Adria had grabbed a medkit from the floor, it had likely been on the table beforehand, and immediately went to patching up the open wound on Rea’s shoulder and back.    As she was working, Loro moved past and headed for a set of stairs. He stopped before going up and said, “When you’re done get up here and help us out. I’ve never seen this many Chazrach before and they’re still coming.”    “Looks like they finally got tired of you,” Adria mumbled as she kept working. Her eyes glanced up to Rea, “Stay down here and keep an eye on the door. Something tells me that won’t hold long.”    Rea shook her head, motioning upwards with her blaster pistol, “If there’s as many out there as it looked like, going to need every blaster you can up there.”    But Adria didn’t budge, as always, “If that door gets breached they’re not only in behind us but there’s also two unconscious pilots down here next to you.”    With a sigh, Rea gave in, “Fine. I’ll keep an eye on them.”    A smile formed on Adria’s face as she finished up with the small bacta-laced patches and then got to her feet to head to the roof, “I’ll make sure to tell the Commander how you felt about having to protect him.”    Before Rea could respond, the human woman headed up the stairs and out to the roof. Rea let out an annoyed sigh and sat back against the wall behind her, blaster in her lap and waiting. For the moment, she could sit safely and catch her breath. It would be obvious when she needed to be ready to defend the door.    After only a few moments of sitting there listening to the muffled sounds of blaster fire above, the Twi’lek noticed something else. There was a quiet beeping to her side. Curious, suddenly, Rea tilted her head to find the source of the sound. Her eyes immediately locked onto a blinking green light in time with the sounds on Commodore Nok’s jumpsuit.    And then she knew what it was.    Immediately, Rea’s hand shot out for the object and grabbed the Commodore’s comlink. Pulling it to her, she hit the activation switch and said, “Zephyr Five here.”    “Five, this is Four. We just arrived in system with the fleet and should be to your location in a few minutes. What the situation down there?”    The voice that came through was that of her wingmate’s, the Kel Dor Tar Ko, and probably one of the most wonderful things Rea had ever heard. Of course they’d come back. Of course the fleet had come for them. The Admiral wouldn’t leave them. He was too good a man for that. And the green Zephyr pilots that the Commodore had ordered to retreat had done exactly what they’d needed to: they brought back help.    In front of her, the door shook violently from a powerful hit.    The joy of the moment before was suddenly gone and Rea pulled herself to her feet, saying into the comlink, “We’re on the surface of the moon, Four, and we’re under heavy attack. The Commodore’s badly wounded and nly a few of us are here. We’re surrounded by a horde of Vong from the sound of it. Won’t be able to hold out long.”    “Copy, Five,” Four’s voice was doubly modulated through the comm system and his own breath mask on the other side, but she could still hear the worry in the voice, “That moon just erupted with skips again but we’re coming in. Just hang on and we’ll push through right to you.”    When there was another thud at the door, and Rea saw the thing buckle just slightly, she hoped they actually had time.</blockquote>

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