So, instead of "what the hell you want, a*****e?", "how can I help you?"; instead of "b***h", "miss"... Well, it's not that difficult: it only kills the fun and is completely different from my personality. Still... She said that sometimes being nice is more effective than being the best. Maybe I should... His thoughts where cut by a sudden wobble, red lights were now on the ceiling of his room and an alarm sounded all the Spire through.
"We are under attack! The Sith have intercepted our route. Assault transports incoming, all arms to the bridge!" It was Carth Onasi, the commander of the ship; speaking via the P.A. of the ship.
"Darn! I'm supposed to protect..."
"Blaze, do you read me? This is Bastila. Respond, please." Bastila? Why is she calling me? There is no need. I have sworn to protect her, though she said something about Jedi don't having bodyguards... Why is she?
"This is Blaze. Bastila, do as you please; but don't take risks. I'll be right there in a minute. The other Jedi might be able to help you until then, won’t they?" Bastila didn't like the sound of being protected, so he had learned it's euphemistic synonym the first: being helped.
"No, Blaze, thanks but its not about that: you remember the new Ensign, don't you?" Now that was a bad thing to remember: he definitely didn't like her. He didn't trust her: she hadn't done anything to be trusted about, had she?
"You mean R, I mean, Wine Vin-Kari?"
"Yes, of course I mean her! You have to make sure she survives the attack. Send someone to pick her up and say it was my orders; but, please, don't mistake her name again."
"No! I mean, no! Bastila, are you mad? you are the one who must survive, not... Anyone else. I've sworn to help you, not her."
"Excuse me? I thought you would do me a favor and forget your thoughts against her. Maybe I should ask one of the Jedi who are here protecting me?"
"No! Ok. Ok, you win. I just hope you know what you are doing. May the..." How was it? Focus? No. Fog? No. Damn! Bastila and the other Jedi are always talking about it. Food? Nah, I don't figure them always thinking about their stomach. Oh yeah! I've got it! "May the Force be with you." At this point, he thought he had heard a low laugh coming from his comm.
"May the Force be with you too." Bastila-Shan shut down the transmission and the man began working on the control panel on the further end of his room. Different security cameras were displaying on the screen; changing at high speed so he could find his target, the sooner, the better.
"There she is! Sleeping... Well, let us activate her shift alarm." The woman on the bed sat up at light speed and hit her head with the low ceiling of her bunk (there was another bed above hers). She, then, fell to the bed again, obviously out of game.
"Uh oh... This one would have been funny in any other time, I suppose. Well if you ask me, she deserved it: for lazy sleeping. Let's find someone to get her up..." He displayed a map of vital signs on the screen and centered it on the nearest Republic of her room: Ensign Ulgo.
Well, at least this one even shares the room with her. I just hope telling him that these are Bastila's orders is enough to make him listen. Maybe I should try to be nice. Blaze powered on his datapad and re-read the last entry that had made he stop to think properly:
If you want someone to do something for you, do something for him/her. This is called "owing a favor" and it's value depends on the important it is for the receiver.
And... What the hell! He sure knew what was the most important for a soldier in a battle: weapons, med packs, armor... It was all nearly unnecessary if someone told you what to do step by step and led you to the weakest enemies and the most convenient paths.
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In the bunk under his own, Ensign Ulgo saw a young woman rubbing her head.
"Hey you! Ensign Vin-Kari. Wake up! We need to go," he yelled at the woman.
The woman rubbed her auburn eyes again and focused on Trask. Her shoulder-length black hair was matted over her face. "What? Who... Who are you?"
"I'm your bunkmate, Ensign Trask Ulgo. We have opposite shifts, which is why we haven't met yet. Come on! The Endar Spire is under attack."
The woman began to slid out of bed but stopped frozen and covered herself with her sheets again.
"What are you doing? I said we are under attack! Come on, Ensign, get up." Ensign Ulgo was growing impatient at the apparently laziness of the woman in front of him, how could anyone sleep in a time like that?
"I'm trying, you pervert! But, if you really didn't notice by yourself, I'm naked here! Could you please have the decorum to turn away while I get dressed?" It wasn't a question, and Trask knew she was getting angry. Well, it was an unexpected yell, but she was right, so he did as asked and Ensign Vin-Kari slid on her garments. She took a vibroblade, tested it on the air and strapped a Republic standard blaster to her right thigh. "Ok, I'm ready. Where are we going?"
"Commander Onasi has given the order of all arms to the bridge, that's where we are going. The strange of it was that I was given the order to come and get you there instead of letting you go on your own. Ok, so you were top of your class and have had the advanced tactical training, didn't you? I don't know, but guess I shouldn't question the Jedi."
"The Jedi? They want me for something?"
Trask opened the door to the corridor. "It seems so. The mercenary protecting Bastila is the one who transmitted my orders directly from Bastila herself. Maybe you have some of that Force stuff?"
Sparks flew from the overhead throughout the corridor as an astromechanic droid worked on an electrical panel. The futility of its efforts was evident as Trask and Ensign Vin-Kari ran past.
As they pressed against the further door, Ensign Vin-Kari whispered, "Wait a second. Who are Commander Onasi, Bastila and this merc you are talking about?"
"What?! Did you hit your head or something? Commander Onasi's the commander of the ship, not to mention a hero of the Mandalorian Wars. He's got more combat experience than the whole crew of the Spire. About Bastila, she is the Jedi in charge of this mission. It was her battle meditation that allowed us to even stand against the Sith's numerical superiority and her strike team took down Darth Revan a couple of months ago. I thought that would turn the tide, but Revan's apprentice, Malak, only picked up where Revan left off."
Ensign Vin-Kari felt almost stupid at not knowing such things, but Trask hadn't satisfied her curiosity yet. "And the merc? Maybe it's because I've just waken up, but I think Jedi don't usually hire mercenaries to protect them, do they?".
"Well, finally one good question. I don't know anything more about him: he seems to have been hired to protect Bastila, but I've never met him: he gave my orders via communicator and advised me for the quickest way to get to the room without facing any Sith, though. Shall we continue?"
The woman nodded, then brushed her hair back and scratched her head. Things seemed foggy. She could not remember how she got aboard the Spire. A flash of memory tore through her mind.
The Republic Marine Academy on Coruscant? Yes, I just graduated. My parents were worried for me, but so proud. I was the top of my class and the best duelist in single sword style. Also one of the best in the dual swords one. My name? my name is Wine Vin-Kari and I'm from Deralia. I got aboard as a last hour reinforcement just after graduation.
Trask entered a code into the door and it split open with a hiss. Blaster fire could be heard in the corridor. Wine peeked around the door frame to see a firefight between Republic Marines and Sith Troopers. It was obvious who was going to win: the Republics were at a loss, firing with the few blasters they had left and covering themselves as they could. The Sith weren't by far in this bad condition: their silver armors reflected some of the blows, they were firing with rifles instead of normal blasters and they had better cover. A Sith grenade finished the remaining Republics of the fight and three silver armored men emerged from their covers brandishing longswords. They made sure their enemies were really dead.
Trask grunted. "Their assault transports must have landed. We'll need to get past them to get to the Bridge. It seems their armors are good reflecting blaster shots, so I recommend you to use that sword of yours. You know how to do that, don't you?"
Wine swung her vibrosword with her right hand, placed it above her head pointing to the enemy, the left hand extended. She balanced her weight on her right foot and put her left one forward in a most impressive stance that revealed the extent of her training. "Just look and learn. Oh, by the way, take this and cover me while you are at it, will you?" She passed him her blaster and Trask took it while raising an eyebrow. "It seems you do know how to handle a sword. Shall we start? For the Republic!"
Wine led the way into the corridor as Trask took cover in a flank that left him full view of the combat zone. Walking in low, semi crouch, but quickly Wine saw a target come into view. Her breath quickened and her heart raced: this was for real, her first combat. No mercy would come from her enemy if she lost. Well, Wine, now calm down and remember your training, feel yourself comfortable with the sword, get in stance and always dodge the first blow. She raised the sword again and got in her favorite fighting stance. The Sith trooper let out a yell and raced to her, sword up. Two more troopers followed him; but one of them was quickly blasted by Trask.
When both remaining melee troopers reached her, Wine's adrenaline was overwhelming her veins and, when the first Sith blow passed by her head without even cutting a single hair, she experienced something very strange: everything around her became slow and tedious, like seeing a film in slow motion. She, on the other hand, could move perfectly well and focused even better than she remembered doing in any fencing lesson.
One swing of her sword and she cut the hand off the first trooper and, while it was falling, she took the sword from the limp hand and jumped to the left dodging the second Sith, who impaled his longsword into his comrade. Then, she made a not-too-superficial-not-too-deep cut on the back of the second Sith's left knee and kicked it to make him kneel down in pain. Afterwards, she simply knocked him out with the handle of her right sword.
Wine's mind froze for a millisecond when she saw the Sith that she hadn't knock out. Someone's dead because of me...
Now alerted to the presence of new defenders, the remaining two Sith in the corridor threw a fragmentation grenade and moved for cover. For Wine, there would be time to reflect later: she picked the grenade and, again in slow motion vision, she threw it back to its owners. The cries of wounded Sith filled the corridor.
"Wow! how did you do that?" Trask was right behind her, checking out the Sith.
"Do what?"
"Look, sister, I've never seen anyone move so fast or cut so accurate: look at this!" Wine saw her bunkmate take the hand she had cut and get closer to her so she could see well. "A perfect transversal cut, 90 degrees, completely smooth. How?"
"Well... I don't know. Maybe I was just lucky?"
"And what about the speed?"
"I'm sorry, I don't know." Trask eyed her suspiciously. She definitely didn't like it. "Shall we go?" This seemed to, somehow, wake up Trask.
"Yes... Yes, of course. Never mind, let's go."
Trask opened the next door and they were greeted by the sight of a man and a woman locked in mortal combat with lightsabers.
"Stay back," urged Trask, "We'll just get in the way. That woman was with Bastila Shan, she is a Jedi as well."
The two combatants moved with an unearthly grace, raining blows upon each other. The air crackled and hummed with the dance of their lightsabers. The man was encased in silver armor except for his bald head. His weapon was a red beam of light that flickered with deadly energy. The woman was attired in orange robes that flowed with her every move. Strangely, Wine saw by the corner of her eye that the man on her right was, sort of, comparing the two duelists with her.
"You know? Maybe it's me, but I think you were moving quicker than them." Trask sounded serious, but it couldn't be: the simple thought made Wine laugh, a little.
"Me, faster than a Jedi? Sure. What'll you say next, that I'm stronger than a rancor?"
"Hey! No need getting it that way, I was only saying what I had seen!" By his reaction, Trask must had said it very seriously.
The Dark Jedi lifted his lightsaber in a completely offensive stance. Wine disapproved it mentally: that was, for sure, a comfortable position to attack; but it left the fighter completely defenseless, giving the opponent a good chance to counter attack(luckily for both of them, they were on the female Jedi's side).
"Ok, sorry. But I think it's you: I can't even see well all their moves."
As Wine spoke, the female Jedi crouched and made a quick horizontal swing with her blade, which killed her opponent before he touched the floor. However, before she could even power off her lightsaber, the corridor exploded around her, tearing them both to pieces. Trask rushed out to help, but it was too late. He shook his head sadly. "Damn! We could've used her help. Well, then, let's see.." Trask glanced around, as if trying to orientate. Wine looked as well, not able to understand why he was hesitating. "Well, I've got two news: one good, and the other bad."
"The good one first."
"I know this corridor: that door leads directly to the bridge. However, the explosion jammed it."
"I wouldn't call that a good new."
"It's better than the other: I don't know any other route."
"What!? And can't we, you know, repair the door? Or blow it down?"
"Only an authorized officer can reset the controls, and the door is made of a very thick layer of durasteel: the required explosion to blow it down would also destroy all the corridor and we couldn't get through it. I'm no officer, what about you?" It was obviously rhetorical: he knew she was only a just graduated Ensign.
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After having made sure by his control panel that Bastila and most of her fellow Jedi were safe and outside of the ship, the black-haired man stood up and readied himself: he picked up his brown jacket and put his two data pads in it (he used one to store all the guides, maps and general information and the other to write down his own memories). Then, he entered the code on the lock of his chest and retrieved his most precious possession: a hand-sized medallion with a long durasteel chain in one extreme that allowed it to be worn around the neck.
Once he had put on both jacket and, over it, the medallion; it got strapped to his chest like if it was part of the jacket and it's central crystal shined a bit in gray tones. He kept watching it for a second. s**t! It's always blue on Bastila and the other Jedi... Well, at least it's not red like the last time I'd put it on... It was, indeed, a very rare crystal that shined in different colors depending of the side of the Force it's carrier had affinity for at the moment. It was very sensible and changed even by short-time emotions. A present from Bastila. She said that this way he'd be able to control himself.
He ran down passed the corridor. Left, right, left again. Then stopped and hid himself in the shadows of a corner. He had to get to the east escape pods before the Sith blew the Spire... When the troopers passed by, he continued. If Bastila had only left me have a blade... Well, better thought, when she said "no" we were on allied territory and I was more than eager than to chop someone's head. I guess it's a different matter right now.
While he was thinking about if he should get a weapon from somewhere or not, he ran into a four-Sith squadron that was patrolling the place as if it was theirs. When the silver armored men saw him, without weapons, some laughed while all of them prepared for melee combat. He smiled and stood still, in the middle of the corridor, watching them as they moved in low motion to attack him. He could hear one of the troopers joking with another: "This will be fun. That fool hasn't even a weapon on him." Yeah, it'll be fun... For me.
The medallion on his chest changed slightly into red as he dodged the futile attempts of attack of his foes. When one of them tried to impale him, he simply jumped and landed on his sword. Then, Blaze quickly kicked him strong in the face, breaking helmet, nose and skull.
When the three remaining Sith saw that, they backed off a second, as if trying to explain themselves what had just happened. Never one to take down an opportunity, Blaze picked the blade from the corpse at his feet and, while still crouched, rolled backwards and swung the sword. A silver helmet tainted with blood fell to the ground, followed by the body.
The young but experienced death combatant remembered then what one of those Jedi had said about letting the enemy surrender. That Jedi had said it was the right thing to do. Blaze stood up and placed himself so he could perfectly see both still living opponents. In the corner of his eye, the medallion was as red as the first time. He smiled again and stood still, in the middle of the corridor again, the vibroblade was in his right hand, while the extreme of it rested on the floor. He watched as they moved a bit backwards, obviously remembering the stance. "Run." Both troopers dropped their weapons to the ground and ran down the corridor; the medallion was gray, maybe a glimpse of blue would have been able to be seen if he watched it carefully.
Blaze picked up the weapons and ran again towards the east escape pods section; only stopping to kill some more enemies that were not wise enough to quit when they saw him. When he arrived there and saw that there was only one escape pod, he remembered Bastila's petition about the Ensign. He turned around, activated a console nearby and scanned for her life signal. What? they haven't even reached the bridge yet? Well... Here it is, there is one more escape pod at the west section of the ship, through the bridge. One vital signal on a console nearby, like me... Carth Onasi, well he'll wait, I suppose. Message sent: he'll wait. Now, what are the two Ensigns doing in front of the ******** bridge? Are they scared of the Sith in it, or what?
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They decided to improvise a stronghold in front of the bridge: if they couldn't protect it from inside, they could still do it from the outside. Trask was all the while grunting and grumbling something about his orders. As she used one med pack to heal her leg, wounded in one of the multiple fights they had been involved into while they were mounting guard, she heard Trask's personal comm beep intermittently and a male voice emerged from it.
"Ensign Trask Ulgo, this is Blaze, why aren't you following you orders?" Wine was taken aback by this question. Blaze? Is Trask following a mercenary's orders? Oh yeah, I remember now, the orders are from Bastila, not the merc.
"What do you expect me to do? The door is sealed and only an authorized officer can reset it." It was evident to her that her comrade was very stressed.
"Is Commander Onasi high-leveled enough to open it via console?"
"Well, of course he is! He's the commander of the Spire, after all."
"Pack your equipment and get ready. I've sent him a message and he's working on it. Bastila's already out of the ship, destination: the nearby planet. Taris, I think it’s called. Commander'll wait for you with a three person escape pod ready on the west section. You should go through the bridge to reach there."
"And what about the Sith? There're surely lots of them in there."
"Don't worry, I've sent them a more... consistent message. It definitely has my signature on it. I'm boarding my escape pod now. Ensign Vin-Kari has a new entry on her datapad: it's a detailed map with the two most direct routes." Just then, a beep sounded on Wine's pocket. She extracted her datapad from it: it was true. "May the Force be with you."
Wine turned to Trask. "May the Force be with you?"
"I suppose being with the Jedi influences people."
After they had packed, they approached the bridge door. Green light: it was functional again.
"You should use your melee weapons, the bridge is small and it's suicide to use ranged weapons in close quarters," said Trask readying his blasters. "I'm better with blasters, however. Is it ok with you if I cover you from behind?"
"Didn't the merc say he had already taken care for the bridge?"
"It's better to expect the unexpected, even more so with the Sith."
"Ok. But keep an eye on your blade, just in case." Wine took her two vibroblades off her belt and opened the door. Trask threw a flash grenade into the bridge and they covered without even looking in. When the grenade exploded and they didn't hear a single noise, though, they didn't know what to do. Trask motioned Wine to wait and stay in cover while he threw another grenade, this one was fragmentary. Explosion. Deathly silence. Wine couldn't wait more and peeked from the security of her cover. The single vision of the bridge on it's actual state made her dizzy. She returned to her previous position and wanted to vomit. Trask was also growing impatient and did as she had done. His face became totally pale and he didn't bother to return to cover. "Holy s**t..."
Wine, now prepared for what was going to see, entered the door with Trask. The computers and lights were off, but it wasn't dark: fire everywhere at sight prevented the room to be in darkness. Burned meat and smoke stink filled her nostrils as she went forward. "Really, I think no signature would be better to the name Blaze than this one. But... Was it necessary? So many deaths..."
"Listen, I know you don't say it with bad intentions, but it's a war and it is very simple: you kill them, or they kill you. By doing this, He has opened us a path. Let's go."
"Okay..." Obviously, Trask saw that she wasn't totally centered, so he decided to make a smart remark to cheer her up a little.
"So... What is your signature? Do you get drunk? Or you knock out your enemies with a wine bottle?"
"Hey! That's not funny!" She stopped talking for a second, mentally viewing the scene of her 'possible signatures' proposed by Trask and a small laughter escaped her lips. "Well... Ok. Maybe a little. But, still, I don't do such things." Following the joke, she drew her tongue at him and continued by another door that, if Blaze's map was correct, leaded to the shortest route to their escape pod.
They both entered the next room and thanked the Force or whatever was in charge of cosmos that let them breathe fresh air again. Trask appeared to have heard some sound.
"There's something behind here," he said indicating the door across the hall. He ran to the door, prepared his vibroblade and opened it.
As sparks flew from the ceiling, a man stepped forward, clad all in black. His head was bald save a black goatee and his eyes radiated fierce hatred. He twirled his red double-blade lightsaber with the practiced hand of a master. The Dark Jedi watched first Trask and then, Wine. "Do my eyes betray me? You are alive yet? My master will like to see the corpses I'll bring to him."
Wine's eyes grew large. "This is the end", she whispered. Strangely, she didn't see anything in slow motion like she had before when every battle started. Was the Dark Jedi neutralizing her ability? Could he also fight like she had done before? How where they going to survive to that kind of handicap?
Trask grit his teeth. "Damn, another Dark Jedi. Go! I'll try to hold him off."
"What? He'll kill you!"
Trask quickly grasped his backpack and threw it to her. "I have my orders." He shoved her back and rushed to the Dark Jedi. A quick blow of his blade to the terminal that controlled the door sent it slamming down behind him, jammed.
Wine didn't know what to do. "Trask! Wha...I..."
Just then, her comm beeped an a different voice came from it "Ensign, this is Commander Onasi. I can't wait much longer. You need to hurry. Get to the escape pods."
Not wanting to leave Trask behind, Wine tried to open the door with all she could think of until she heard a terrifying scream beyond. The scream was cut short. Wine's eyes reddened and grew wet in a held cry and sweat beaded at her face. I have failed to him. Trask's dead. What will I do? What have I done? With a hiss, the red blade of a lightsaber pierced the metal door, the Dark Jedi now wanted to kill her. She would remember his face forever, now he was her worst nightmare personified. Wine fell back with a yell as the lightsaber slowly cut downward through the metal. As the fear ran through her veins, Wine leapt up and rush to and adjacent door in slow motion. As it opened, she leapt out of the room and jammed it shut. She could feel the Dark Jedi finishing with the first door and, panicked, she fled.
"Ensign, I have you on my monitor. There is a Sith squad up ahead. If you can get to it, there is a combat droid you can reactivate. You can also slice into a console and use the Spire's security systems against them. Unfortunately, my link to that section has been jammed. You must hurry," urged Onasi over the wrist communicator.
Still in slow motion from the adrenaline running through her veins, Wine ran down the corridor and opened the next door. Two Sith turned abruptly and raised their weapons, but Wine had already chopped the head off of one of them. She turned to the other one, across a two meter-long desk and threw her left blade. The Sith fell to the floor with the tip of the vibroblade thrust in his throat. She was too panicked to pick up her sword again, and even to think about using non-deadly techniques. All she could think about was the fear of the man in black armor who was following her and how she wanted to escape from him. Somehow, something about him had made her spine chill even from the first time she saw him. She jammed the door behind her and looked around to where that terminal should be.
There! The terminal!
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Carth Onasi was watching in disbelief how fast the female Ensign's vital signal was approaching his own on his monitor. Suddenly, the door opened and he saw a tall woman, with shoulder-length black hair, enter the room and freeze at his sight. She was sweating, some scratches were visible on her armor, and she had a thick layer of dust and blood covering some parts of her body. Her face was pale and horrified. It seemed as if she had been fleeing from a ghost
Carth decided to talk first: at this point it seemed as if she didn't recognize very much the difference between enemy and ally. "You made it just in time..."
She didn't stop to listen him: as the woman saw him hailing her instead of attacking, he stopped to be of interest and she started to look desperately for a way to close the door behind her. "How did you close it?!"
That wasn't expected by Carth."What?" This made the woman turn to him. He saw desperation in her face. Carth decided that it was best to help her close that door, if that made her calm down. "Eehh... Well, yes, that terminal over there closes it." He saw her run to the terminal and getting to work in it. "And... If you want, you can also lock it from there. Only an authorized officer will be able to unlock it. What's happening?"
When the door had been sealed, the woman sat down on the floor panting, next to the console, exhausted. "Dark...(pant), (pant).... Jedi.... killed... Trask..." He didn't recognize the name; but, at least, he now could understand what had happened to that woman. He decided to keep pleasant to her for now: she was terrified and any brusque action could result in more panic from her. He had seen that happen with many soldiers after some specially stressful missions.
He approached her, crouched besides her and put a hand on her shoulder. When they made eye contact, he saw it in her eyes: she was really in shock. He made his move:"Come on, there's the escape pod, he won't be able to follow us there."
He saw her face recover a bit her normal color and he could tell he had spoken the correct words. Though she was still a bit reluctant to make any move, she got up with his help.
"Okay..." She seemed absent. Though Carth didn't know what was her voice usually like; damn it, if he didn't even know who she was!
The Spire's critical core state alarm sounded as they got close to the escape pod and he unceremoniously flung her into it. He leapt in behind her and punched the separation button. The hatch sealed and the pod was blasted into space.
Onasi squirmed in behind the woman with his body up against hers. "Sorry, these pods are pretty small. Trask's place has been occupied by our equipment."
"Commander Onasi, I presume?" She was, for sure, a lot more relaxed now that she was away from her fear source.
"That's correct. Damn these Sith, how did they find us? The Spire's destination was supposed to be a secret." Carth fumed. He then started to talk about something, but he stopped when he saw his companion pass out. He figured she was too tired to continue. Multiple Sith squads, a full guarded bridge... And a Dark Jedi? How did she survive through that? Who is she, anyways?
He, then, noticed her personal datapad in her pocket. He took it and started reading her personal file while the large city-world, Taris, grew nearer to their pod.
