As everyone was getting ready to try to get the attention of the AT-STs Arthur opened the com to Undertaker.

"It would be best if I could send a group back to report what we found here.  So I need you to take half of the squad and head home, and you can take that as an order if you need too."  Arthur said in their native tongue.

"Roger.  I'll take Zizi, Zark, Ghost, and Ruwe and you can get the rest." Undertaker replied.

Arthur and the rest of the squad took flight and Arthur took the first shot at the AT-STs clipping one and leaving a hole where it hit.  The three AT-STs then started to fire at the ties as they were keeping them busy for Hark to get over to Tinkers Tie.  The squad was doing pretty well for not being able to use the whole sky as their battlefield.

Maroy was able to get a few hit on the AT-ST that Arthur shot and made contact when Hark came over the com telling them that he was on board and ready to fight.  With that message Arthur set the remote self-destruct on Harks tie to go off in four minutes.

"OK guys and gals we have about four minutes to get out of here unless you want to be taken out by the tie that is about to blow up.  Remember to stay low and away from the base"

Abrae - Two rotations after the events on Unknown Moon designated 6Y22E

Rain poured. On the moon it was the dark period of rotation not that it mattered under the piercing gleam of the Naval Headquarter’s overcharge, overpriced, energy draining lamps. It must be the cave-dwelling genes within her Twi’lek heritage but Cali was easily irritated by the intense light; not that she needed any extraneous reasons to be annoyed. That was not even the create way to summarize her current emotional state. The coldness she had felt emanate through her body during these last turbulent months in the Starfighter corps was rapidly entering a new ice age except for a faint flicker. That desperate flame was quickly dying upon being briefed by her Flight Leaders on the disaster that had befallen their squadron. In the events on that cursed moon of anguish they had suffered, she had seen her pilots unravel. They were not Stormtroppers, they were not marines – it had been a colossal overestimation to send a bunch of ‘fly-boys’, some of them still kids out on such a mission. 

In her make-shift office, the usual overturned munitions cargo crates where doubling up as uncomfortable chairs for her two Flightleaders; Thane and Arthur. The two Zabraks sat in silence, both possessed decidedly opposite personalities but in this case they could have been almost from the same tribe given the way each other mimicked the other’s stoic body language. Rhegent’s Reign was fast becoming a depository for the navy’s stoics and cynics. The disaster had certainly stripped them of their colour, no flash of red passion remained. Cali finished skimming over the reports on her smashed data-pad; the relic is what ‘She’ had called it. There was no-one to tease the Twi’lek now.

‘I will pass this on with my comments gentleman. How are the rest doing?’ She turned from one face to another, neither seemed to keen to voice their assessment. Thane inhaled deeply and croaked his reply.

‘They’ll adjust to the changes ma’am.’ In these instances it was often a blessing that no-one in the room first language was basic. It allowed for an excuse for things to go unsaid.

‘G-good, make sure they’ve all been cleared by the medical board. I don’t want anyone back on duty if they’re not fit, physically or otherwise…’ She placed the datapad down on the remaining upturned crate and unconsciously patted her fingers across the deep scar on her lekku.

‘I have my concerns about Maroy and Miss Lor. I know you and others like Seth have been subjected to that kind of thing before but we can’t have blossoms fading. Everyone’s experience was bound to be different, they‘re good at accommodating people’s personalities…’

‘I have my eye on them.’ It was odd but to Cali it sounded more like a threat than a reassurance.

Arthur sat and appeared to be murmuring something in an unfamiliar tongue to him-self. Cali assumed it was part of his mediation. They all had unique ways of dealing with the horrors. His green eyes flickered refocusing as he seemed to come back consciously into the room.
‘May I ma’am?’ Cali nodded and managed a weak smile.

‘How is your leg doing?’ He gestured his palm openly to her left leg which she had propped up on a pile of empty tea canisters. 

‘Healing, they tell me I’ll be able to get back into a cockpit within the fifth cycle.’ Not that if truth be told she was desperate for that occasion. The very idea of being encased in that tomb of dura-steel caused Cali to break out in a cold sweat.

‘But thank you for the tea Arthur; it has helped with the swelling.’ She tapped her braced heel in appreciation on empty canisters with a hollow sound. She winced in pain. Not the smartest idea she thought. ‘That’ll be the last time I go to toe to webbed-toe with a flying fish.’

‘Still no word from Tuk’ata?’ Thane asked referring to mysterious circumstances that their sister squadron had disappeared from official naval listings.

‘I’m due to meet with the our newest Wing Commander and, I don’t know if it is just me, but something smacks even more fishy than any vanishing Mon-Cal in an Interceptor about the whole thing. I’m sure its related to with the jacked nature in which we where used on the forsaken hunk of rock.’ She could feel her cheek begin to burn with a flush of anger. She look down in disgust at her weakness, lay out before her on the heap of canisters. If had not been for her foolishness on that ill-fated joint-squadron training exercise up at Asteroid 19 it would have been her and not Tinker that had led the recon-mission. She would have made sure that everyone had returned. She would not have allowed herself to fail. What good did it do to have a commanding officer lead from the front? Cali had not even been able to provide air-support given that she was banned from using a starfighter until she was over her injury. Her stupid injury had cost the squadron one of their best pilots and one, perhaps her only friend and ally in this political circus of a military organization.

‘It goes without saying, however, gentleman that we keep our concerns about our deployment to ourselves.’ She still had yet to have a face-to-face contact with their new Wing Commander and whilst she doubted they could have the same steely fear mongering of ‘ol’ ironside’ she knew there where political, power-play machinations in which she had to accept she was but a hapless pawn. Where possible she wanted to keep her squadron sheltered from the knock-on effect such tides bureaucracy could have on them.  Both the Zabraks nodded in silent agreement at her request. Cali still had some allies even if she felt like she had lost a sister.

‘I agree with your suggestion Thane, we really should get some time out on the rifle range. If we are going to be used as a recon-unit than we need the correct skill set. We were lucky to get through with the numbers we did.’ But that’s the benefit of recruiting assassins and cut-throats she finished to herself silently. She shuddered inwardly on reading the statistics of some of her pilots exploits. The Falleen ‘Ghost’ as he went by had amassed a simply staggering kill count it filled Cali with a sickly feeling. Then there was the case of Seth and the Wookie, she didn’t like to think ill of any of her charges but the actions they had taken were simply ugly. Unfortunately she was not as naive to not concede that it was a certainly a positive to have the Wookie on their side. The universe was ugly so Rhegent’s needed the ugliest people they could find.

‘If I can leave you two to co-ordinate an opportunity to give our lot some firearms training that would be immensely helpful. Just make sure we don’t have any unauthorized personal belongings brought to the exercise, we don’t want anyone doing a Slasher.’  Thane chuckled at Cali’s reference to their former Fallen co-pilot, recently reassigned. Cali had once the experience of being shown the tour of his personal weapons collection. She was amazed given his role in the Navy that the sly reptile had had the time to amass such an unnerving assortment of instruments of pain and destruction.

‘Don’t worry ma’am we’ll get it seen to.’ Cali motioned to stand, wincing as she began to shift her leg.

‘Please ma’am,’ Arthur began rising to his own feet in his crumbled fatigues. ‘There’s no need we can see ourselves out.’

‘Th-thanks,’ Cali managed to muffle amongst the searing pain that struck up her leg to her weary brain. ‘I have to see to the documents concerning the arrival of our replace.., the new executive officer.’ She looked down to avoid meeting the inquiry in both their eyes.

Thane cleared his throat out of politeness and navigated his way around the mess in her office and ducked his hulking frame though the door.  He made a sign to Arthur with his hand with crossed fingers, Cali was oblivious to its significance. Arthur nodded slightly and waited for his co-partner to leave. As Cali leant back in her chair in an attempt to anchor the pain in her leg, Arthur moved silently toward her ‘desk’. Without any flourish he produced from his tribal gown that he was oft to wear slung over his fatigues a well worn, half-full bottle.  The label had long since been worn away but Cali instantly recognized it for what it was.

‘I recovered this from our departure...’ His words echoed away from Cali’s consciousness. She carefully fingered the bottle’s cap, unscrewing it with a tremble. The strong aroma filled her nostrils.

‘A toast to absent friends...’

Both wincing at the taste as it slid down their unaccustomed palettes their thoughts turned to the bottle’s missing owner. Cali placed the bottle down with clink, hollow like her heart.

The door swished open as Zizi crept through. She glanced around to make sure nobody was in the room, and then entered. She pulled out her comlink and set it to her private channel. Whew, I'm finally away from that irritating green Twi'lek.

"This is Lor. Report."

"The procedure is going as planned. She'll be ready to go within a week."

"Very good. Have you planned her..."

Suddenly the door opened again and Maroy stepped in. Zizi quickly shut off her comlink.

"Who were you talking to? Answer me!"

"Oh, uh... I was ordering my lunch."

"That doesn't sound very convincing!"

"Look, what's your..."

"You killed Tinker!"

Does she suspect... No way, she's way too stupid.
"What are you talking about? I was never near that base."

"I don't know how, but you're up to something and I think the NR have something to do with it!"

"You have no proof."

"Well... It turns out I forgot to shut off my fighter properly, so I have sensor data from the whole time we were gone. It detected a speeder come by, and I know for a fact none of us were in it. That was just a minute before we got there, and you were already there. So you must have been in the speeder."

This is a problem. Only one way to fix this.
"Fine, you caught me..."

Zizi reached into her pocket and pulled out a blaster pistol. Maroy raised her hands and cowered.

"Not one word of any of this to anyone, or I'll personally ensure you never make it back from your next mission."

Maroy nodded her head violently, and Zizi put the blaster away. They both turned to exit the room when a human male about Maroy's age came in.

"Excuse me, is this the... sorry, I was looking for my new commanding officer. Do you know where..." He glanced at the name on his datapad, "Kay-lee-ree-harn is?"

Zizi nudged Maroy, who was extremely pale from fright, and the Twi'lek answered him.

"You mean Cali'reharn? She's just around the corner, third door on the left... I mean right."

"Are you okay? You look a bit pale..."

"I-I'm fine... just... a little tired. You must be one of our new pilots?"

"Yes. I'm Freman Talla, but I usually go by my callsign, Kazack."

"Good to m-meet you, Kazack. I'm Maroy, and this is Zizi Lor."

"Well, I guess I should go report. See you later."

Kazack left the room and Zizi let go of Maroy.

"Remember: Not one word."

The Zeltron left the room, leaving a distraught Twi'lek behind.

After reporting to his new Squadron Leader and writing out his report Kazack took a seat in the cantina. His flight leader Romanflame came over and introduced himself. He sat at a table with his wingman DeepSix and another pilot. They talked about a few things. Namely how Kazack had gotten through the academy and how he was settling in. Kazack was hoping that the squadron would be sent on his first mission soon so that he could prove that he, the rookie fresh out of the academy, could  handle himself in a firefight. After politely excusing himself, Kazack left back to his quaters on the planet of Abrae. He quietly occupied himself reading a holodisk for a half an hour until he fell asleep.

Laser bolts flew all over the place for a short while as the Onderonian and his flight leader pushed forward, managing to somehow down more and more opponents. Lesser individuals would've no doubt failed to pull that off, as the constant return fire was bound to scare the hell out of most sane people. Seth had no clue what was going on through the Zabrak's horned head but then again so long as the latter would keep on pushing forward Seth didn't really care much anyway. As for what was going on through his own little head? Well the answer was nothing. He just concentrated on rushing the enemy position all the while putting shiny bolts of light into anyone trying to do the same to him. That was it. No great plan, no proper direction, no nothing... Just instinct. Plain ol' instinct and a shitload of luck. He had to be a lucky son of a bitch after all to manage to avoid getting hit by all that return fire. Well, maybe not that lucky actually since he would realize soon enough that a bolt did manage to nick him straight in the shoulder. With the adrenaline wearing off and the pain quickly growing however the smuggler still thought himself lucky however. Sure the nasty injury would hurt for a while but at least that would be all. No risk of dying from blood loss - directly or indirectly...

Where the hell are those two?

It wasn't like he didn't like trying to hold of that gate against a lot more enemies armed with a lot more and bigger guns but more like... well no, come to think of it he actually didn't like that one bit. Sure the gate's walls would provide a better cover against the approaching troopers but dammit it was only a matter of time before those bastards would manage to once again regain control. It was inevitable and DeepSix knew it. He knew it and yet found himself staying put all the same. The man himself was surprised upon realizing this. Why was he risking himself for these fellows anyway? He was an opportunist, a fellow that couldn't care less about honor and duty. The only thing he ever cared for was loyalty, friendship and doing everything it took to preserve those. So then why the hell was he risking himself now? Was it that he somehow started looking at these other guys as more than just colleagues? More than just temporary acquaintances? That was one possibility... Another however was that the Onderonian had simply flipped and decided to go crazy. Then again that wasn't like him either...

I couldn't have picked a better time for realizing this crap...

Grinning sarcastically the Onderonian shook his head and fired a few more shots. The orbital cover fire was obviously a great deal more effective but that lacked finesse. Proof of this was the fact that some Republic troopers would still try and be brave or stupid enough to brave the artillery and try to be heroes. It wasn't until the fire from above ceased that Seth cursed its departure. Now that the damn enemy no longer feared getting blown to little tiny bits more and more waves of troopers started making their approach. There was some good news too however. The missing captives were finally close. They got closer and closer and closer and... just as they were about to finally get to safety - if it could be called that at all come to think of it, well the damn sensors started powering up. Time itself seemed to slow down as the Twi'lek flew through the bluish mass of atoms that was starting to form. But time was a dangerous ally and a much more dangerous enemy... The Rhegent XO learned this as well as that force field formed before her, preventing her escape. No, she likely knew this before that happened. Knew it and yet chose to ensure the safety of a subordinate rather than trying harder to make it out herself.

[[Get out of here with the others. I'll hold them off.]]

The Onderonian stood motionless for a few moments staring at his XO's back. All of a sudden Tinker's frame seemed so small and fragile as more and more enemies popped out, all of them shooting at her. The redhead appeared to be holding her ground somehow but Seth knew better than expecting miracles. He had seen enough last stands to know how they all ended up 99% of the time. Even if Tinker would manage to survive and get taken back alive chances were a rescue mission would no longer find her in the same installation. If anything the whole base was likely going to be set to self destruct now that its location was revealed. Either that or severely reinforced with both ground troops and orbital defenses if it was somehow important enough.

To think this is the second time i'm leaving a woman behind...

The Onderonian would finally turn his head and follow the other two. Sure he wasn't comfortable with this but at heart he was a survivalist. The kind that knew that staying alive meant making hard decisions. At least he did not have to carry the guilt of making this particular decision. Living with it yes, but then again that was something he had experience with already. Maybe this was what being ruthless meant after all - the ability to keep on living despite anything and everything. If so was that really a bad thing?

That train of thought was brought to an end upon meeting up with the other Zabrak, two other pilots... oh, and the furry Wookie. Well at least the doormat survived and appeared to be in fairly good shape... At any rate DeepSix would continue making his way with the others to the crashed shuttle. He didn't really understand why they were going there rather than heading straight for their birds but hey, at least that little detour allowed them to meet up with yet another fellow. Now that their little band of merry pilots was reunited they could all...

THUMP! ... THUMP!

[[Run!]]

Yeah, as if they needed to be told that. The huge walkers bringing down the trees around them were obviously dangerous enough not to be taken on. Besides, the trees would manage to hide their exact position and prevent proper hits. Not that those random ones didn't come awfully close quite a few times. Well at least getting blasted away would be a better way to die than being squished into a nasty reddish paste.

I'll be damned, i can't believe we made it.

Well, made it out of the treeline and back in the clearing where they landed hours ago. The sight of those beautiful black birds was better than anything at the moment as far as Seth was concerned. Trouble was that being in the open there was also no longer any place to hide. Nor any more trees to cushion some of the blows from those huge blasters. Well at least the Interceptors weren't all that far away...

Come on baby, we're getting the heck out of here.

First thing DeepSix did after powering up his craft was powering the shields to max. He only had to deal with the blast of a nearby hit however. Good thing there were lots of crafts to target...

Finally airborne.

Taking advantage of his newfound mobility the Onderonian pilot flew above the three threats and turned behind them. He then linked all four of his blasters to shoot at once for maximum penetration. He managed to get a couple of solid hits on one whilst everyone else flew around and seemed to use air-to-air tactics instead. Granted they were flying Interceptors, and these were best used against other flying crafts but that did not meant they were supposed to attack everything in the same manner. Especially since these walkers had less mobility, could only fire forward and were otherwise easy enough to take down with a few strong hits...

[[OK guys and gals we have about four minutes to get out of here unless you want to be taken out by the tie that is about to blow up. Remember to stay low and away from the base.]]

As Seth kept a steady position directly above the remaining walkers, he started searching his cockpit for the first aid kit. He needed something for that bummed shoulder of his after all. Especially since it was somewhat affecting his flying. Finally feeling better he opened the comm channel:

"There is still the matter of the downed shuttle. I'll take care of it though, over!"

Not waiting for approval or anything like that Seth just headed for the crash site. It was after all their mission - to investigate that signal. Now that they knew what the signal came from and that the NR knew where it came from too it made sense to deal with the issue. Ideally the site would've had to be preserved and properly investigated but seeing how it was in enemy territory and how possibly important Empire secrets could've been leaked to the enemy it made more sense to blast the whole place up. Alas an Interceptor's blasters could only do so much damage but for what Seth had in mind that was still enough.

The pilot required only a few seconds to reach the crash site. He had to maneuver his own fighter so that he would be able to target the wreckage but once that was possible he just started firing and firing and firing some more. He continued firing at what was left of the shuttle till he himself found himself under fire once again. It seemed those walkers decided to follow him now that they had no other targets to deal with. Well, it was just as well since the Onderonian no longer felt welcome there anyway... Pulling up a bit the pilot made good use of his thrusters and made for the other side of the damned moon. Once he would be sure a firing solution would be impossible from the air defenses on the ground he would pull up and return to the relative safety of the open space.

"Mission accomplished... If there was anything of value in that shuttle it's full of holes now."

~~~~~~~~~~

It was a chilly night, made perhaps more so by the pouring rain. Despite this Seth sat alone on the balcony of his apartment. He had no top on and a new bandage covered his left shoulder. The rain somehow managed to flare his pain, but the Onderonian couldn't really care less about it. Right now he had a whole lot of other, more important things to think of. There were after all so many questions left unanswered. Questions regarding that mission, what went wrong in it, why he had those strange thought during and afterward...

"So many questions and yet so few answers..."

He would mumble this under his breath before taking another swig of whatever clear liquid he was having. The thing was sweet yet at the same time strong and the pilot felt it burn slightly as it went down. It felt good though as it made him warmer. Warmer... and more confused as well. The pilot would look at the dark sky above and see the tiny raindrops falling down. He would look at them and find himself unconsciously taking another swig of liquor. He would find no answers tonight that much was certain but even so he would not stop seeking them out all the same.

~~~~~~~~~~

"...And here comes our flight leader now."

It was the introduction the Onderonian pilot gave Arthur as the latter approached their table. Seth noticed Hark when he first came in so he decided to go and sit with him. Then the rookie showed up not long after that. Odd how the Onderonian pilot happened to meet both his wingmates in this cantina and both times by accident as well. Well maybe the new fellow would stay alive longer than the last guy, whom Seth only got to know for a few hours before dying during that exercise. Talk about bad luck on his part...

"See you later."

Seemed the rookie had someplace else to be, no doubt needing to settle in and everything. Well, chances are the two of them would talk more later. As wingmates it was only natural. Of course that was assuming they wouldn't be sent on another stupid training exercise or worse, a failure of a mission. One of epic proportions even...

"What do you think of him?"

Both Seth and Hark would share impressions for a few minutes before again returning to other topics, happier ones. It wasn't like either of them were trying to ignore what happened but at the same time both knew better than clinging to the past, especially since it wasn't really in their power to do a damn thing about it. Life sucked! It was as simple as that...