Slow could be the only word to describe the activity around the Storm Platoon barracks; sim rooms were out for the yearly maintenance, the console database was down, forcing most of the work to be done via paper, and the most action that Riqimo had seen was a rather nasty incident with the automatic stapler going haywire just two days ago.  Riq’s newly appointed Platoon Adjutant was still busy prying them out of the walls while the Commander occasionally peeked under one of his numerous bandages to check on the healing process while sitting at his desk, eyes occasionally glancing at the supposedly repaired stapler, and body ready to dive under the desk at a moment’s notice.

“I don’t recall this being in the job description,” Gio muttered as another staple clanged to the bottom of the waste basket.

“I think it is covered in the part that I can delegate tasks to you that I would otherwise be doing myself... of course I could be wrong,” Riq shrugged as he leaned back and slid a few sheets of paper into the stapler and half jumped back at the ’click’ of the piece of metal binding the pages together.  At a ringing noise, Riqimo’s chair hit the back wall and he was huddled underneath his desk.

“Doc...” Gio chuckled, “It’s your comlink.”

“Ya I knew that…” Riqimo peeked up and cut a glance at the stapler as he picked up the comlink, “Sergeant Major Riqimo Pershaw speaking, how may I be of assistance?”  Riqimo nodded to Gio to keep working as the PC leaned back against his desk

“We have a volatile situation on our hands, all the other platoons are out on duty or drills, and you are the only platoon we have available immediately,” a highly accented voice came on the comlink with a hint of urgency.

“And this is... ?”

“Rupert Cavendish, Imperial Intelligence.  All you need to know.” Riq settled back on his desk, forgetting about the stapler and shuffling a few papers to make room.  “All that matters right now is that your platoon needs to prepare for deploying.”

“Umm...” Riq shuffled a few more papers, “Where to?”

“I said prepare for deploying you bloody idiot,” Riq raised an eyebrow as he held the comlink back from his ear, “We’ll tell you where when we are ready to get you there.  You just get the bloody troops ready.”

“Yes sir...” Riqimo heard the click of the stapler and instantly dived for the floor.  Just then the man on the other side of the comlink switched off and Riqimo peered over his desk once again to chuckle that he had pushed a paper into the stapler.

“Doc, you really need to settle down, it’s not going to do that again,” Gio smirked at his commander’s edginess.  “Anywho, need me to round up Pally?”

Riq nodded and tried to pull the paper out of the stapler, “Ya that would be good,” he nodded as Gio left.

Sighing that the paper wasn’t coming out easily he gave another tug, a little harder this time, bringing the stapler falling to the floor.  Oh sh... Riqimo ran for the door without a second thought, only to receive a staple in the arse just as he reached the door frame.





Riq staggered slightly to the makeshift podium in the vehicle bay, trying to hide the pain of his earlier 'engagement' with the stapler.  “Well, apparently we have an imperial defector from the Intelligence division, a Ptaph Tigellinus.”  Riq eyed a staple in the podium for a moment and paused.  Regaining his focus, he raised his head to see the Jesters on the left side of the group.  Smiling weakly at Decembrist, who was staring at Riq as if the man was insane (quite plausible), the PC adverted his eyes over to Eclipse in the middle and focused on Alater’s toothy grin, “This man has been gathering support for years and now has the intention to fire several missiles that the Vast Empire Army keeps on the island of Cahvalho, northeast of Sianat.  He has the intention to fire these out of orbit and onto the surface of Nodriss.  The radiation of several of these missiles, let alone several tens of them, can cause a dangerous reaction on the gas giant.  I don’t quite understand the science behind it, but something about the gases heating up and forming a super heated plume that would engulf the entire moon of Tadath.”

“Seeing as he is also on Tadath, wouldn’t that be a suicidal move?” Kami, the Jester leader, questioned.

“Well... theoretically speaking, and according to these notes I have,” Riqimo looked down at the datapad and spotted the staple out of the corner of his eye again, “He would be safe in a bunker facility that the missile launch command would be issued from.  So anything not within a heavily fortified bunker is pretty much obliterated or charred.”

“Why hasn’t he already launched the missiles?” Baretz, one of the newer members of the Platoon and in Paladin Squad, inquired.

“Because Tadath has not yet completed the rotation around its axis that would allow the island to fire directly at the surface of Nodriss that we orbit.  This gives us approximately... sixteen hours.

“It is our fortune that the island is under-defended in terms of actual sentients holding it.  However the automated anti-air enforcing a no-fly-zone makes things rather... difficult in the approach.  I hope you all don’t get sea sick easily...”  Riq shrugged and continued, “We’ll be taking a nice amphibious assault vehicle ride once we arrive at the military docks of Sianat via the shuttle behind me. Find a seat mate or two, fasten those buckles and let’s not waste any more time.  We’ll get some more support once we reach the docks, we are not going alone apparently, so some relief there.”

OOC:

There you have it, Storm Platoon story officially started, and running from now until meeting time on Sunday (4 PM EST).  If you are in Storm Platoon, please feel free to join the #Storm channel on IRC so that we can get this wagon train moving along easily.

For reference:
> Map
> Tadath Info (incomplete)

Alater wasn't very sure about this entire mission. Moving underwater was something he had never done and had only heard bad things about. Space and air travel were fine with him, even subteranean, but moving on or under water was something very wrong and against nature. It didn't help that oceans in general made him very uneasy. On his home planet any water that remained on the surface after the day time was either vapor or too radioactive to drink or use. Having an ocean of water was just too much.

As Alater looked amongst his squadmates he recognised their unanimous look. They had last a man on their last mission, Rike. He had been young, healthy, and well trained but despite everybody's best efforts he had died a miserable death. The squad had all promised undying revenge on the ones responsible and a few had even had the personal glory of feeling that evil life slip away between their fingers.

Death was never an easy thing, and the Dark Dragoons had suffered a little too, but these were all trained men and women and they would get over it. They had better, because the enemy shared no feelings for them and would not hesitate to remove their life from this world.

Alater moved from the group towards his customary large duffel.  This time he was packing lighter, no armor save a black chest peice and only two pistols and a rifle. He haulled the huge bag onto his back, filled with ammo and other assorted nasty tricks and headed towards the shuttle to find himself a nice seat at the back where he would be alone. Not like anybody ever sat with him anyway.

Kreic was sprawled out on his bunk when the order came in to report to the briefing room, He wasn't sure how long he had been sleeping, or what time it was. 

A few minutes later Kreic bolted upright in bed, eyes wide open and his toes cold form the lack of a blanket big enough to accommodate his tossing and turning.

He was used to the training sergeants constantly telling him when,what, and how to do everything, a day of relative freedom on the shuttle and sleep was welcome. Kreic started to drift off to sleep full of good food and women in revealing trooper armor. 

"Crap!"  He exclaimed as he got into uniform.

He found his smaller duffel bag full of off duty clothes and emptied it out on his bed. Hastily, he secured his newly issued armor in it,with the handy securing straps.

At this point, he wanted to carry his issue pistol, he was army after all,why not carry it? Before shipping out he had purchased an after market holster for his sidearm. Tailored to fit on the equipment belt issued with the armor, it allowed the pistol to strap to the thigh of his armor, or his leg if wearing his uniform.

After this, he assumed he was late, gabbed his duffel bag and made his way to the briefing room as fast as he could without running.

He walked into the room, now buzzing with the nervous movement of backsides on the seats of chairs. A peculiar shuffling that was a trademark of the Army briefing session.

Upon entering he had noticed the squads were seated in sections, pretty much all talking to each other within their group. It wasn’t hard to locate Paladin, they had the fewest number of troops currently in the Platoon, but it didn’t bother Giovanni. As more recruits came in, things would change. He had only been in charge of the squad for a few weeks after all.

He lugged his heavy duffel bag with him and took a set next to Luckystar. Finch was a seat behind him next to Baretz, who seemed more anxious than anyone in the room at the time.

“I assume you guys all got the message?” Gio inquired. The squad returned nods of approval, and Giovanni noticed 3 identical Army issue bags filled to the brim with weapons and ammunition.

“Good. I want you guys to-” Giovanni’s holopad began to buzz. A new message had arrived.
---------------

*** INCOMING MESSEGE ***

Private LunaTick, you have been assigned to Paladin Squad in Storm Platoon. Your Squad Leader, Gunnery Sergeant Giovanni Bryden, will contact you and state the various details that he has about what the squad is currently doing and how to get you involved.

Upon your graduation of the Academy, I hereby elevate you to the rank of Private First Class.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask your Squad Leader or any of the Army High Command staff.

--= signed =--
General Cosmic
Commander of Training
CoT/GN Cosmic/HCA-3/Tadath/VEA/VE
[OPE][OTH][OPA][EW1][CDS][IH][GS][BC][LM][SoS][CRoM][CoH][PoC][MSM][SCP][SoA][IOC]

-----------------

Giovanni finished reading the message and raised an eyebrow. A young man was darting through the door, almost tripping on his own feet as he carried his bag and came to a halt before the Paladin’s squad leader. He snapped to attention, answering the question Gio had in mind.
“Private First Class Kreic Eldari, reporting for duty, sir!”

“At ease, private. You came along right in the nick of time,” he gave the young man a smile and waved him to a seat. ASL Luckystar introduced herself as well, and the squad, now five people strong, shot their attention to Platoon Commander Riqimo Pershaw.

"Dang it all!!!"

A loud crashing sound could be heard coming form the closed quarters. Inside Saphira, was milling threw her closet in search for her last few items to be thrown into her duffel bag. All her weapons were already down in hanger but one thing remained. One of the few things she kept with her and now it had seemed to grow legs and walk away.


Her silver eyes looked up at her wall clock. The time seemingly gone by faster just to irritate her even more.

"Great.. I'm going to be late.. Not good.."

Saph hissed and dove back into the closet, clothes and other odd assortments flew out and landed in piles around the room. Not that it mattered to her. It would all end up back in the closet to be sorted threw later when she got back.


The female hissed and was about to give up when she moved a smaller box on the bottom of her locker. There it was! Her favorite vibroblade from the first mission she had with Eclipse. The handle, mutilated and transformed to look like a part of a wrench. She smiled knowing how long it had taken to make it look just right. Her hands grazed over the cool metal before placing it in her right boot sheaf. She then hurried to place all her stuff back into her locker and the room appeared once again clean. Thank god they didn't do inspections inside of their closets.


"Wonderful, now I can hurry over and be one of the last to show up.. Doc's not going to like this.." She smiled knowing how much she did like to annoy him. Yet this wasn't the mission she needed to be a pain in the ass. With a lighter step she grabbed her duffel and hurried out of the room. Making sure it was locked and walked briskly down the hall to the hanger Bay were everyone was gathering to load up.




~FEW MOMENTS LATER






Riq stood just outside the shuttle. His face a look of serene responsibility with a hint of annoyance. Most everyone was accounted for but there was one he hadn't heard from yet.


Dang it Saph. I don't need this.Not now...

He grumbled for himself and was half tempted to leave her behind. The only thing stopping him was by doing that it meant a load more paperwork for him to deal with. He already had his fair share and adding something like that wasn't to his taste for the moment. Just before he was about to go and do something Saph rounded the corner and his eyes caught her.


Narrowing his eyes he could see that the Twi'lik was carrying a more lighter step and practically was beaming with smugness that she knew would drive him insane. Well he wasn't going to give her the satisfaction for the moment.


Looks like Doc dosen't know if he's happy to see me or not.. cool!

Saph thought as her silver eyes sparkled with a darker amusement. She dropped her duffel to the side. Letting it hang and weave in the air as she approcahed him.


"Sorry Doc.. Had to find something that I needed for the mission.." She muttered.


Doc rose his chin slightly. His eyes meeting hers with a dark glance. Part of him wanted nothing more then to just wipe the smile off her face. But he knew she would only enjoy that she got to him. Sometimes he wondered why with everything she had done she still made the rank.

God help the future if she ever gets a squad to herself.. He thought. Out loud :

"Just get on the shuttle Saph.."

She nodded and brushed past him. Her boots tapping up the ramp as she disappeared inside. Doc shook his head. Maybe it would be a good thing if she dealt with a squad. Even better if she had a troublesome soldier of her own to deal with! The thought made hims smile and then he returned back to what needed to be done.

Once the briefing was over, Kreic took a moment to Strap on his armor,check his weapons, and make sure they were loaded. Once that was out of the way, he found his duffel bag empty, so he left it in the briefing room.

After a brief 'hello' by everyone, he found himself a seat in the shuttle with a sullust, Being raised by an Imperial officer, he found this.. unnerving. Sullustrians  were known to have helped the rebellion in the past. He didn't like it, but he wasn't here because  he wanted to be, he was here to do a job.

If nothing else, should be entertaining..I wounder if i can drive the boat.. he thought to himself.

The mentioning of the boat ride prompted ideas of jumping the wake of other boats and the surf, provided the waves were big enough.

Once he settled in his seat and strapped himself in, leaving his helmet in his lap. Attempting to overhear others conversations and learn Names and rank, just in case he needed them later.

Kreic made one last check of his weapons and sat there, trying not to look to eager, and to be honest scared, at the thought of real combat. He assumed he would be on dry run mission to get to know his squad better, but, so much for that.

"Anyone else hungry?" Kreic Asked, "I forgot to eat..." Almost as if he expected someone to hand him a ration.

Lucky was seated with Baretz. He looked professional except for a glint in his eyes that showed pure excitement. She hoped he wouldn't go crazy on her during the ride.

She nudged him , and when he looked at her questioningly , she gave him a look that said "you won't be so excited once someone gets injured."

When LunaTick talked about being hungry she smiled to herself. By now, she knew exactly how the rides started out. "you won't be so hungry  in a couple minutes....You'll see what I mean."

Both Baretz and LunaTick looked at her this time , she looked at them both before simply saying "the rides can get pretty rough at the start so you don't always want to eat before a mission."

When she got no answer , she turned back around so that she faced the seat in front of her. She was sort of happy that eclipse was going to be with them. She had pretty good friends in that squad , and she couldn't wait to fight alongside them.

She hadn't seen anyone from jester yet oh well. She looked around her , at the people talking amongst themselves, at the tense , new members of the vast Empire Army, at the size of the shuttle, at everything.

It helped her to get in the zone , go deep into herself , to meditate. She would do that during the flight , meditate. It allowed you to empty your mind , and when you came out of the transe , you could think clearly. Atleast, taht's what it did to her.

She put her helmet on , for head protection during take-off, closed her eyes, and began meditating.

He closed his eyes, not to rest, but to reflect on the mission they were about to undertake. It was a little harder now to think than back in the briefing room when everyone was dead quiet. Some of the other troopers were getting a little loud now, talking to each other, telling jokes: the camaraderie between them was one forged by laser fire and concussive blasts out on the battlefield and it was not a bond easily broken.

At least their minds were no longer on the task at hand. That’s not to say they weren’t determined to do whatever it took to restore order to their sector of the galaxy, but they had to release some of that tension somehow, and there was no open bar on this shuttle. It was the first thing Giovanni had noticed.

He tried once again to relax and took a deep breath.

“I’m hungry!” someone behind him yelled. It was Kreic.

The shuttle took off and jolted violently from side to side. All of Eclipse squad yelled in unison at the pilot. Kreic no longer looked so hungry. In fact, he was now colored a slight tint of green. An emphatic “I told you so” came from Luckystar, who sat next to him and was quick in handing the young recruit a barf bag. If he was going to be vomiting anywhere, It wouldn’t be on Lucky’s newly repaired storm trooper armor.

Giovanni gave up on the whole trying to meditate thing. It was no use.

He turned to Ievit who clung desperately onto the arm rest.

“Not a big fan of shuttles, I see” commented the veteran trooper. He had been on much stinkier, seedier transports before, on location to much more dangerous places. This was a luxury ride to him.

“Oh no it’s just that-” The shuttle jolted again as it began its descent onto the planet below. She closed her eyes and clung desperately to the seat in front of her.

“Ok, you got me. Happy now?” The red tinge had returned to her cheeks.

“We’ll be topside soon enough, don’t worry. We’re at high altitude for the time being. No turbulence up here.” He tried to comfort her, but he knew as well as her that all she wanted was to get the hell off of the shuttle and onto solid ground.

Once he saw Ievit settle back into her seat, Giovanni faced forward again and tried to get as comfortable as possible. All this talk about “Cartwheel” McCarthy was making him nervous.

He wasn’t sure if it was Eclipse squad’s way of making him and his troopers nervous, or if there was any truth in their claims of high speed maneuvers that bordered on lunacy. If the jolts and sudden turns in the beginning of the trip were any indication, the ride would get a lot more interesting before they touched down at the imperial docks.

He looked over to Ievit once again, who sat comfortably, probably glad that the tossing and turning was over. Poor gal. She had no idea. He wanted to wake her up and warn her, but part of him wanted to see her startled awake at the apex of a nose dive into an immelman turn.

He chuckled to himself. I’m such a bastard.

Behind him, Lucky was meditating. How she could do anything resembling meditation in such a loud environment was beyond him. Baretz, next to her, was gritting his teeth slowly. Sometimes the look in his eyes scared Gio ever so slightly. It’s like he had way too much energy. He was still green. He didn’t know the rigors of real battle. He’d find out soon enough.

Siiiigh

The sullustan a few rows behind him was starting to get to him.

Giovanni closed his eyes and did his best to block out the noise of the engines, the chatter of the almost twenty storm troopers all packed into a shuttle, the incessant blabbing of the sullustan, and most importantly, the constant thoughts running through his head regarding the task at hand.

After awhile of being into her silent environment , she slowly opened herself up back to the world around her. Slowly but surely, the noise factor started getting louder.

The roar of the engines , the chatter of the sullustan , the sound of many voices  , talking , loads of loud talking over the roar fo the engines.

She looked over at Baretz who still looked slightly green .

"You ok , man?" She asked the young soldier. He just nodded , still gritting his teeth and staring ahead. She doubted that he was telling the truth , but then again  , males needed to keep a little bit of dignity.

She had strapped her things already , so there was no immediate danger of getting hurt by her belongings. looking around, she noted that some troopers still hadn't strapped their belongings. She hoped that those would not come near her seat.

When the ride smoothed out a bit , she deemed it safe enough to take off her helmet. she undid the clasps , and lifted the helmet. There was a click and a hiss as air came out of the helmet. she set it beside her , and unstrapped her rifle to polish it.

While she wa spolishing , she looked around her once more, and was happy to see taht everything seemed alright wit hher squad. A row in front of her , Gio sat beside Finch who had seemingly fallen asleep.

Smiling , she stowed the rifle back into a compartment, and sat back , hoping that "Cartwheel" McCarthy would spare them the complicated and dizzying acrobatics. the last thing they needed was to look like a bunch of drunk soldiers coming out of the shuttle.

Cartwheel’s unorthodox style of flying was making the Sabacc game near the back of the ship pretty difficult.

“Who would have thought we needed this many aerial maneuvers when he’s flying a ship full of storm troopers and there are no rebel ships or anti air guns around. I’d hate to have him fly us straight into a battle zone.” Ievit was still taking a nap, and didn’t hear him, but Lucky and Baretz chuckled a bit in the seats behind him.

They would be landing soon now, and Giovanni was glad. He disliked the lack of control in riding a shuttle somewhere. He didn’t like the idea of putting his life in some stranger’s hands, even if he was a highly skilled ex-tie fighter pilot turned Army chauffeur.

Looking back he saw a small group congregated around the Sabacc deck, all playing the devil’s advocate just to start an argument about some facet of the game. Had this been a seedy cantina in the outer rim, the arguments would surely break out into gunfights. Giovanni had been in a couple himself.

Occasionally the spacecraft made awkward banking turns. Cartwheel must have been bored in the cockpit of the cumbersome shuttle. He began to sway and roll the spacecraft from side to side, causing the deck to spill all over the metal floor of the passenger bay. Ievit woke up, disoriented and reached for the nearest thing that was safely hoisted to the ground.

Cartwheel kindly reminded everyone where his nickname came from, and turned the craft completely upside down, and then back to normal again.

From behind him he could hear the soft splash of vomit entering a barf bag.

Dax got up. As he did he heard a pinging sound coming from his pocket. As he looked down he noticed it was from Brytanni, he decided on reading it, but almost simultaneously Goblins voice called from the cockpit.

well, maybe I can latter. He thought. He filed himself out as the rest did the same, it was crowded then Dax was used to usually Dax got the front seat and got out so he never noticed how fast everyone else was filing out, or how packed it was in tight quarters, but now he could tell. It was almost a eye opening experience except for the fact, it really wasn't something he should have been thinking about.

Blackout tapped wicket on the shoulder. Who jumped a little bit. Dax had to move back so they wouldn't fall over.

“Gotta  question, you still have that gun I let you borrow.” Dax asked, trying to make it feel like they were moving a lot faster, and it was actually working.

“no, gave it back remember.” He said. Looking forward.

Dax had remembered, but he was hoping to make some talk. guess not.

As he finally got out and felt a nice whack on the side of his face. To his surprise it was Wicket swinging his duffel bag around. Dax had a feeling this was going to be a long mission.

Riqimo was one of the last ones off the ship, despite his efforts to get off first.  The others seemed to have the exact same two words in their heads... ”terra firma”

Swallowing back that tingly, burning feeling at the back of his throat, the platoon commander, spilled out with the squads to receive a few glances from eight men lounging about.  It wasn’t the most professional approach, but Riq squeezed himself forward and smiled uneasily, shaking the man’s outreached in a firm handshake.  “Colonel Rupert Cavendish,” the tallest man of the group introduced himself, “Jolly good of you for getting here as soon as possible.”

“Sergeant Major Riqimo Pershaw, and no issue, we are proud to serve the Vast Empire in her times of need.” Riqimo brought his hand back from the greeting and clasped both of them behind his back, nodding to the men seated upon a few crates,  “And I assume this the ‘elite’ forces that we will be assisting?”

“Aye,” Rupert nodded, “Finishing up a spot of tea and waiting for fuel; then we’ll be getting ourselves ready to sail towards the island in our crafts.”

“Umm, you have anything more... sea worthy?” Riqimo blinked at the three boats floating at their pier.

“Are you daft?  Those are the most sea worthy crafts we have for this bloody mission.” Rupert rolled his eyes and nibbled on some sort of pastry, ‘We head out in forty minutes once the fuel we need gets here.  So occupy yourselves somehow.”  He narrowed his eyes strangely at the squad, “Maybe get them some sturdier legs?”

Riq chuckled, “They’ll be alright, just give ’em a moment, it was a hell of a ride.”

“Ah, jolly good,” the man nodded with his peculiar accent and went off to a thermos to pour something steaming hot into a cup.

Intelligence guys are peculiar, Riq thought to himself as he headed back to the platoon to relay the news, “Forty minutes til we can head out, so it’s a little platoon bonding time I guess.”  Riq headed into the shuttle and came out with a rather large bag.

Opening up and sticking his head inside in a manner that no one else could see within, Riq shuffled his hands inside a bit until he reared his head up, wearing a ridiculous hat that made him look somewhat like a banta.  Donning a small cape, the resemblance to the Tatooine creature was obvious.  All the while the platoon stared at him blankly as if he lost his mind; Riqi dug through the bag again and tossed Gio a red scrap of cloth and a wooden stick.

The Paladin SL realized instantly what Riq had in mind and grinned as he jogged for the open area of the dock, Riqimo finished donning some kneepads before he went after the Adjutant, most of the squad unsure of what was happening, or refusing to believe it.

“Ready?” Doc shouted out, ignoring the itch at the back of his neck from the bantha pelt.  Hearing the laughing of the others on the sidelines, Riq opted to have some fun while he waited and wiggled his romp a bit, letting some louder snickers and hoots from the troopers.

Eclipse obviously sided for their squad leader, and Paladin did likewise.  Jester on the other hand was either split between cheering for their commander, adjutant, or just starting slightly amused.

Gio’s words of confirmation came though the horns of the hat a little distorted, but clear enough for Riq to smirk and make his charge.  Rolling his eyes upward a little to see where he was stampeding, Riqimo let a chuckled escape at the absurdity of what he was doing.  At a mere five feet away, Riq lowered his head enough so that that curled horns would impact against Gio if his aim was true.  A quick sidestep on Gio’s part and a wack on the arse where the staple hit the PC earlier caused a yelp to escape Riq’s lips.  There was more laughing and a few jeers from the sidelines, and by now the special forces wandered over to see what the commotion was.

“I’ll get you for that Gio,” Riq shouted as he made a wide arc to turn around.

“Bring it on banta-man!” the amateur bantafighter shouted back, “That was nothing!”

Chuckling at the confidence of his opposition, Riqimo decided to try a tricky little tactic, charging normally as before, only swinging his head back and forth as he neared  Matador Bryden to discourage a simple, nimble sidestep.

Gio was forced to dive away to avoid his commander’s charge, rolling away before quickly regaining his feet to avoid another charge from Riqimo, who ignored the sweat starting to form in the itchy, stifling cape to turn around without slowing his momentum.

This time however, Gio was ready with a trick of his own and bravely stood his ground as Riq came directly at him.  What is he? Insane?  Just at the last minute Riqimo realized what Gio was attempting and immediately tried to get out of the way... too late.

Giovanni rapidly assumed a crouched position and sprung up just as Riq’s forearms impacted; the smaller Eclipser being tossed into the air and finally landing on his back, cushioned, thank god... by the batha cape.  Gio struck a triumphal  pose with one foot on Riq and the stick held up the air, “I dub thee a dead banta,” he jested as he lowered the stick to tap Riq lightly on the head.

“Touche,” Riq chuckled, “like to see you try that with a real bantha though, odds are you’d get mauled or trampled.”

“Probably,” Gio extended his hand to pull his superior officer off the ground and the two bowed to their platoon, receiving either cheers or disbelieving stares.  It was to be expected that some folks thought the two men insane, but Riq sure as hell didn’t care, it was fun despite being conquered in such a humiliating manner.

“If your... ‘antics’ are over with,” Rupert blinked a few times, “We got the fuel and are ready to head out towards the island of Cahvalho...”

“You heard the man, break up into groups and get on one of the three ships we’ll be heading out to funland.”