The Rise of Pulsar Company/Chapter 6

The innie leader was probably giddy with himself under that hood, although neither Kyra nor Nax could tell under that hood, only able to see the cocky smirk. “You know too much. I can’t risk a loose end by letting you go, so here’s a simple choice; join us – or die.” he said slyly, keeping the bryar pistols charged and aimed at their chests, ready to pierce their hearts if need be.

Biting his lip, Nax’s mind raced on what to do. He had no reason to join this little insurgency, let alone get himself into trouble with the Empire, especially considering Kyra’s situation. Then again, having a gun pointed at you sure did change a lot.

A quarter of a minute had passed, Nax and Kyra remaining silent. “Allow me to make the choice easier for you.” the leader said, dropping the bryar pistol pointed at Nax to the wayside, and reaching the now empty hand out to Nax’s face, as if to grab it.

But he didn’t.

Seeing his chance, Nax tried to reach for his shotgun, but found he couldn’t. The thought was there, but he couldn’t act on it, like something was blocking him. Nax quickly felt his limbs go numb, unable to even move his fingers. All fine motor control had suddenly been ripped away from him.

Already beginning to panic, the situation wasn’t helped by the slowly growing headache he had. At first it was just like any other headache, but the numbing feeling only intensified the longer whatever was happening went on. Eventually, it grew into full on pain, a pain so unimaginable, so agonizing, there couldn’t be any manmade equivalent, and his body began writhing on its own. Whenever he tried to focus on something, it was always cast to the side, like a piece of trash. It was as if an angry beast were taking his memories and throwing them around like toys, just out of his reach.

Nax’s eyelids shut on their own, and he grimaced, now having noticed the sharp ringing in his ears, like tinnitus. Just barely audible over the ringing, Nax heard Kyra shout “Stop!”

The pain and the ringing instantly disappeared, and Nax’s motor control returned, too. Falling forward, Nax hit the ground, just barely catching himself from hitting the floor. He held his right hand over his chest, trying to keep himself together, having apparently not been breathing through the whole ordeal. Labored breath after labored breath, Nax tried to follow their conversation.

“Why shouldn’t I continue?” he heard the leader say condescendingly.

“We’ll join you! Just – just don’t hurt him anymore!” Nax heard Kyra plead, begging the leader. “Please!”

There was a brief pause, and the leader got up from his chair. “I’ll take your begging as a yes,” he said, and Nax felt the weight of his shotgun lift from his back. “I’ll also be taking these. When you’re done, report to your squad leader in the mess hall.”

The leader’s footfalls grew more distant, until Nax couldn’t hear them anymore. Kyra rushed over to him, lifed him, and pulled him into a bear hug, tears streaming down her face and into his shoulder. “I’m sorry…” she whimpered. “…I should have shot him…”

Patting her on the back, Nax remained stonefaced. “…Don’t be…” he said before coughing, and Kyra sniffled. “…If you did, he’d have shot you, and probably killed me after. We’re lucky to be alive.” he finished, before hacking fiercely.

Kyra tightened her hug. “…Are you okay…?”

Nax shook his head no, and then coughed several times. “I feel like my mind just got trampled by a Krayt dragon. I…think I can walk.” he said, unsure of himself. Standing up with Kyra, Nax appeared to be able to stand, but as soon as he stepped forward, he stumbled, falling forward, Kyra only just managing to catch him. “…That’s a no, then.” he commented, and she set him against the wall, where he slid down to the floor, and Kyra sat to his left.

“…What are we going to do?” Kyra asked quietly, sounding scared for Nax, and by extension, herself.

“I have no idea.” he replied in a matter-of-fact way, before rubbing his forehead to try and alleviate some of the residual pain. “I’ll think of something.”

Kyra sniffled, and then fell on top of Nax, quietly whimpering. “…I don’t want to die for this stupid cause that I don’t believe in…”

“Neither do I.” he whispered in reply. “But we’re not in a position to tell them no and just run away. We’d be shot.” he coughed, carefully aiming his mouth away from Kyra’s head. “Not to mention, we don’t have our guns. It’d be best to just back down and do what we’re told for now.”

Kyra rolled over to look up at Nax. “…What did he do to you?” she asked, her face red from crying.

Nax looked down at her and shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t have the damndest idea. It was like my mind was on fire – no, like it was being torn into and tossed around by an animal. I feel like I should be dead right now.”

“…Your mind…?”

“Yeah. I’m not sure how to describe it other than having a rabid animal throwing my memories around. I don’t know what he did to me, but I hope it’s not going to be permanent.” Nax replied, before devolving into a hacking mess again. “’Least, I hope it doesn’t become permanent until we’ve gotten ourselves offworld.” he said with a short, dry laugh. Kyra briefly smiled, before sitting back up and resting her head on Nax’s shoulder.

Nax stumbled into the mess hall, arm slung over Kyra, who was supporting him and keeping him from falling over. The mess hall was decently lit, and there were about ten tables in five rows. Three tables in front of them was what must have been the group singing earlier, three men and two women. All appeared to be human and of average height, although one of the men dwarfed the others in the squad, looking more like a short Wookie than a human being, while one of the women was shorter than normal, barely half a meter taller than a Jawa. They all looked more like armored, drunken revelers than insurgents fighting against a galactic power.

Stumbling forward, Nax’s path was blocked by the arm of a figure he hadn’t seen to his right. Glancing over, the person in question was someone geared up in what looked like a mix of Clone and Stormtrooper armor, with the torso, arms, and hands being pieces from the Phase II design, the legs and boots from Stormtrooper armor, and the helmet being a Phase I Clone piece with a rangefinder and integrated binoculars. Under the heavily weathered exterior, one could see a highly faded desert camo, barely visible, revealing the aged plastoid beneath. Covering the surface of the armor were plenty of little bits of graffiti and tally marks, likely signifying combat achievements. In addition, he wore a faded kama, and an orange sandtrooper pauldron over his right shoulder. Holstered behind his back was what looked like the stock of an EE-3 carbine.

“You two the new guys?” he asked in a gruff, serious voice. Nax gave him a nod, and the man gestured to the seats. “You look like shit, take a seat and I’ll run you through what the boss told me, then I’ll introduce you to my crew of jokers.” Kyra gently slid Nax down onto the chair, and sat next to him, keeping eye contact with the squad leader the whole time. “Let’s start things off on the right foot here; I’m Emel, your squad leader for the foreseeable future.” he said, offering a handshake, an offer that neither of them took.

“Kyra.”

“Nax.”

Emel retracted his hand, and rested both arms on the table. “It’s my understanding that you’re not here willingly, and I know you’re not personally invested in this fight, however;” he tapped on the table idly. “That doesn’t mean you get to treat my squad like garbage.”

“I didn’t intend on it.” Nax replied.

Emel nodded once. “That’s good to hear, but I need to be crystal clear with you; I won’t be having any of that petty drama shit in my squad.”

Their conversation was interrupted by the rest of the squad noticing their presence. “Ey, yo, Em! Bring the new guys up!” the tall guy shouted back to them.

Emel shook his head and half shrugged. “I’ll iron the rest of what’s expected of you two out later. For now, you need to meet the rest of your squad.” With that, Emel got up, and Kyra carefully picked Nax up, bringing him over to their table. The two of them sat down at the far end of the table, on the side the big guy was sitting. “Dewback Squad! These two are your new squadmates, Nax and Kyra. Introduce yourselves before I shove a boot up your asses!”

The big guy went first. “I’m Tenan, resident big guns specialist. If you need a walker blown to tiny bits, I’m your guy.” he introduced himself, giving off a prideful aura with his tone.

“And a damn good cook!” Emel added. The squad unanimously agreed with their squad leader’s sentiment.

The short woman went next. “I’m Kelah!” she said, seemingly more energetic than the rest of her squadmates. She stared through Nax briefly, before catching herself. “Oh, right! I work infiltration and recovery!” Kelah finished, making herself come off as at least a bit of a ditz.

The two other men went next, one pale, the other suns-kissed. “We’re the Jun’tra brothers.” they said in unison, pronouncing Jun like hoon. They also spoke in a more thuggish, unrefined Concord Dawn accent. “We’re the squad’s general assault team.”

The tan one pointed at himself. “I’m Jax,” he pointed at his brother. “He’s Dev.”

“Ace meeting you.” Dev said to Nax, before leaning over to look at Kyra. “’Specially you, beautiful.” he said, not even trying to hide his flirting. Kelah and Jax simultaneously whacked him on the head, while Kyra retreated halfway behind Nax.

“Sorry ‘bout my brother, mate. He’s a bit of a womanizer, yeah?”

Their attention turned to the woman at the far end of the table, who was silently watching them. Her skin was pale, she had shoulder length black hair and violet eyes, although her left eye was covered by bangs. Around her neck was a necklace with a single cyan gem of some kind, and she was staring right at Nax, faintly scowling at him.

“You not gonna introduce yourself?” Emel asked her, and she didn’t even flinch. “Fine.” he said, moving behind her. “This is our squad’s sniper-“ Emel started.

“Valona.” Nax interrupted.

“Nax.” she replied coldly.

The rest of Dewback Squad stopped moving, and simply stared either at Valona, or at Nax. “You… know each other?” Emel asked, surprised.

“Unfortunately.” the two of them said in unison, before glaring at each other. Valona switched her gaze from Nax, to Kyra, maintaining her scowl, causing Kyra to meekly shrink behind Nax in fear.

The squad remained quiet, unsure how to proceed, at least until Dev spoke up. “Sounds like we got some good old sexual tension!” he mocked, before Kelah and Jax smacked him again, “Ow! Twat!” he shouted in contempt for the two of them.

Emel eventually shook the sudden tension off with considerable grace. “Well, in any case, whatever past you two had, I’m sure you can put it behind you. Welcome to Dewback Squad.”

Tenan spoke up, raising a bottle of whiskey. “Now, what do you say to a drink? You know, to commemorate our new friends?”

Nax waved his hand in the air dismissively. “I’ll pass. I’ve got enough of a killer headache as is.”

Dev smirked. “You wussin’ out on us, mate? Bit of a lightweight, huh?” he poked, trying to start a rivalry.

Nax stood up and stumbled, causing Kyra to reflexively catch him. “I’d drink you under the table, mate.” he replied sarcastically, riffing on Dev’s accent, causing a collective ooh from the squad, barring Kyra, Valona, and Dev.

“That a challenge, cunt?” Dev snarked back.

“I can make it one.” Nax replied, leaving Dev fuming, although whether it was genuine or not was up for debate.

Kyra and Nax were about to walk out the door when Emel called out to them. “If you’re looking for our quarters, it’s the door behind the medical building! Just claim one of the empty bunks!”

Nax waved to him, back still turned, and headed out the door with Kyra at his side. When the door shut behind them, Valona was halfway done standing up. Emel put a hand on her shoulder. “Remember the rules, Val; no drama.” he warned.

Valona seemingly ignored him, and walked out.

Kyra helped Nax into the squad’s quarters. The room was decently sized, enough to fit two rows of bunk beds, five in a row. Their squad must have been bigger at some point, or they just had a surplus of bunks. Whatever the case, Nax guided Kyra to an unclaimed bunk in the back, near the corner on the right side of the room. He slid off of her and onto the bed, tucking his hat under the top bunk, before falling into the pillow and shutting his eyes. Instead of letting him sleep, Kyra sat down on the bed with him, looking at him.

He opened his left eye halfway and stared up at her. “Do you mind?”

“Er.. I… uh..” Kyra stumbled, having suddenly been caught off guard. She cleared her throat. “Who’s Valona?”

“My ex.”

“How did-“

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Are you s-“

“Yes.” Nax replied sharply, causing Kyra to simply get up and leave, not wanting to press the issue further.

When she got outside, she was greeted with the sight of Valona scowling at her. They didn’t exchange any words, just Kyra catching her scowling at her, before going on with their day. That would be a running theme throughout the day, and Kyra couldn’t really think of a reason why.

Sitting on one of the rocks that hanged over the camp, Kyra stared up at Tatooine’s three moons. She didn’t have any specific goal in mind, she just felt like looking out at the sky. For some reason, it made her think of home, wherever home was. Maybe she didn’t even have a homeworld, she could’ve been born on a ship to a bunch of nomads, for all she knew.

She laid on her back and stared upwards, imagining what was waiting for her when she and Nax got off of Tatooine. She could go to Naboo and forget this ever happened. Maybe Alderaan? They were both peaceful enough planets, surely a nice place to live and just leave this all behind her. Coruscant was also a pretty good option, maybe hire a private investigator to help figure out who she was?

She closed her eyes, suddenly feeling tired.

“Whatcha doin?” Kelah suddenly asked, causing Kyra to jump, panicked, as she didn’t hear her come up. “I-… sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.” she apologized, and Kyra managed to catch her breath and control her heart.

“I… hah, ngh, see why you’re the infiltration specialist now, hah.” Kyra said, breathing deep and gasping.

“Mhm! It’s basically initiation for our squad to be scared by me at least once.” Kelah said as she sat down next to Kyra. “Still though, whatcha doin up here?”

“Not much.” she idly replied, staring up at the stars.

“’Not much’? You’re just up here staring at the sky for no reason?”

“You need a reason to just look up at the sky and watch?”

Kelah shrugged and smiled. “Not really! I find it calming, actually.”

Kyra raised an eyebrow. “How so?”

Kelah laid on her back. “Well, think about it; each individual star up there is just a fraction of the life in our galaxy. You’re literally looking at trillions of lives right now. That may be just a number to you, but that’s trillions of sentients up there with their own thoughts, feelings, memories, hopes, and dreams, hardly any different from you and I.” she rested her her hands behind her head, ruffling her light blonde hair up a bit. “I can picture it; the Sullustans, the Rodians, Duros, Twi’leks, Wookies and Trandoshans, hell, humanity itself, all of them rising up to destroy the Empire’s oppression. It’s not gonna be an easy fight, that’s for sure, but it’s one that I think is worth fighting for.”

“You really think you can just take down the Empire?”

“Not us specifically, but if the galaxy rebels, we can put them down. The thought of everyone uniting to fight the Empire is what helps me sleep at night.” she smiled, before turning her head to Kyra. “Anyways, I wanted to talk to you about Valona.”

“Hm?”

“Don’t mind her attitude, she gives all the new squadmates shit. I went through it, the brothers went through it, now you and Nax have to go through it. She might seem like a bit of a bitch, and, well, that has a bit of truth to it, she’s actually really nice when you get to know her.”

“Mm.” Kyra replied.

“I don’t know what kinda relationship she and Nax had, I don’t know how well they knew each other, and I damn well don’t know what caused them to dislike each other, but I hope they can put it behind them for the good of the squad.”

Kelah had puffed a cigarette that Kyra hadn’t noticed. “By the way, I saw your blaster.”

“You did?”

“Mhm. That’s some nice work, real high quality stuff. I prefer WESTARs myself, buuuut I can appreciate a DL-44 when done right. How much did you shell out for that?”

“…It’s actually not mine. Nax gave it to me so I had something to use. Kinda heavy, hard to draw from the holster.”

“First gun?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

Kelah bumped Kyra’s shoulder. “Hah. I can show you some sleight-of-hand tricks for drawing it faster if you want. Tomorrow, or, well, whenever we have time, I mean.”

“Sure.”

“Great!” Kelah said excitedly, before sitting up and half turning to Kyra. “One more thing; you should probably head to bed soon, the boss usually gets us up early. Like, borderline criminal early. Sleeping in gets you flogged.” she snickered, not knowing Kyra’s past. Kyra’s expression immediately changed to one of fear at being lashed again, and Kelah was quick to pick up on it. “Oh, sorry! I wasn’t being serious, that was a bad joke on my end! The worst you’ll actually get is probably a yelling at in front of all the others.”

That seemed to have relieved some of Kyra’s fears, at least a bit. “Night.” Kyra called out.

“G’night!”

Several minutes later, Kyra came down the canyon wall, and had just entered the base proper. She was about to head for the squad’s quarters, when she felt someone tap her shoulder. She turned, and in the darkness she could only barely make out Valona’s silhouette. “Hey-“ was all Kyra could say before she felt something very cold and very sharp against her chest, and Val’s hand over her mouth.

“Not. Another. Word.” Val said with contemptuous, quiet anger in her voice. “You scream for help, you die. You fight back, you die. You don’t answer my questions, you die. Am I understood?”

Kyra slowly nodded in fear.

“Who are you, what are you doing with Nax, and why are you here? Go.” she seethed, letting her hand off of Kyra’s mouth.

“I-I’m Kyra. I.. uh… I’m his bounty hunting partner. We’re here because, well, um… we got held at gunpoint…?” she said, afraid of getting stabbed.

Val paused for a brief moment, before she flipped the knife around in her hand. “His bounty hunting partner, huh?” she snarled. “Something tells me that’s not all you are for him.”

“I don’t-“

Val raised the knife to Kyra’s face. “Stay away from him.” she warned harshly, flipping the knife around in Kyra’s face, before sheathing it and walking away.

“’Real nice’, huh?” Kyra thought to herself as she headed into the squad’s quarters. “Yeah, right.”

“Atten-SHUN!” Emel shouted to Dewback Squad who were all lined up against the canyon wall. It was an unusually hot day, at least by Tatooine standards. Nax could tell instinctively, while Kyra was kind of just on her own, feeling a bit light headed. “The boss just came down with a job; Stormies’ve apparently been harassing some moisture farmers out Bestine-way. We’re going on a little hearts and minds op to help them out and get some supplies. We’re leaving in half an hour, I want your asses geared up in twenty, in the Seraphs by twenty five.” he shouted. “Move it, ladies!” he yelled, and the squad ran off to go grab their gear. Kyra and Nax ran to the armory, where their weapons were apparently being kept, as they weren’t allowed to carry them in camp for fairly obvious security reasons.

The quartermaster droid, a slightly modified silver 3PO unit, pushed their weapons to them from behind the counter. It also grabbed a container filled with scattergun shells and DL-44 power packs, and slid it to them. Nax pulled the pump back on his scattergun, reached in, grabbed a handful of shells, and started inserting them into the tube, before racking it. He then grabbed another handful of shells, and individually clipped them all to his bandoleer, before slinging the gun over his shoulder.

Kyra reached in and grabbed multiple power packs. She pulled the power pack release on the ‘44, inserted a fresh pack, and poured the rest into the duster.

“Attention, meatbags,”

Right, the droid had been reprogrammed to call organics meatbags. Fun times.

“I have been authorized to allow you to take an additional weapon from the armory. Make your choice, or don’t. I simply could not care less.” it droned along, disinterested. Behind it was a not-inconsiderable collection of blasters, one that Thel would love to get his hands on. Longblasters, carbines, grenade launchers, blaster pistols, even a few vibroswords and Plex launchers were all there. Repeatedly scanning the wall, Nax had a hard time picking what to choose.

His gaze eventually settled on a strange carbine, almost a snub weapon, probably about the length of the E-11, but it looked kind of like if a pistol developed a cancerous growth, turned into a carbine, and then developed one of those weird ass foregrips the DC-15A had. Nax pointed to it. “What’s that one?”

The protocol droid turned to the carbine and pulled it off the wall. “This is a DC-17m ICWS.”

“ICWS?”

“Interchangeable Weapon System.”

“What’s it change into?”

“To my knowledge, there are five configurations; Blaster, Sniper, Anti-Armor, P.E.P, and a breaching grenade. This model is in the blaster configuration; standard meatbag killing potential. Select fire, very useful for the discerning insurgent and mercenary.”

“You wouldn’t happen to-“

“No, we do not have the attachments.”

“Blast. Hand it here?”

The 3PO unit handed Nax the Deecee. “It’s kinda heavy.” Nax commented, lifting and dropping the blaster into his palm. “No stock either. You sure this thing’s controllable?”

“Five kilos. And yes, the Republic would’ve never issued it if it wasn’t.”

“I’ll take it.”

The 3PO unit produced several stick magazines belonging to the Deecee, and handed them to Nax, who clipped three of them to his bandoleer, while setting the rest in the duster. He tried to put it over his back, and then felt the magazine sticking into his back. Taking it back out, he hit the magazine release on the right side of the grip, yanked the magazine out, and set it inside his duster with the other sticks, before returning it to its original position.

Kyra looked up at the wall, and spotted a small blaster pistol with a small foregrip, a cylinder on top, and a short scope. “What’s that one?”

The protocol droid turned to look. “That,” it pointed, “is a CR-2. Very small fully automatic blaster pistol. Extremely lightweight, highly effective at killing in close quarters. It does, unfortunately, chew through ammo, not unlike how you meatbags chew through your own kind.”

Kyra pursed her lips, before gesturing for the droid to hand it over, which it obliged. It handed her additional cylindrical power packs, which she set in a catch inside the duster’s right side.

“Try not to die!” it shouted at them as they walked out.

The two of them headed into the garage, which was situated inside of the canyon wall on the right, when you faced outside of the base. The big garage doors were already open, revealing three Flash speeders clumped together, one with an E-Web welded to the hull. There were also four Z4-Z speeders, and an AT-RT – unarmed, strangely. Kyra and Nax both hopped in the back of the armed Flash speeder, which was already hovering off the ground, while a mechanic worked on one of the unarmed ones. Kyra hesitantly tapped Nax on the side.

“What’s up?”

“Val uh…” Kyra lowered her voice, so as to not be heard. “…she, um…” Kyra visibly gulped, and touched her fingers together. “…was going to stab me last night. Or, well…” Nax looked at her, his face lacking any sign of shock or surprise. “…I thought she was going to.”

“Doesn’t surprise me.” Nax said nonchalantly, as if Valona had always done that. “Val was always a crazy bitch.”

“W-wait, aren’t you mad that she nearly killed me?” Kyra suddenly said, offended at Nax’s seeming apathy.

He looked down at her. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m furious that she even considered it, but this is one of the reasons I broke up with Val; she was clingy as shit. There were more than a few times where a girl looked at me funny, and Val would be on her like a Jawa to junk.”

“Including trying to… ''you know''…”

“Yeah.”

Kyra scooted over, closer to Nax, resting her head against his right arm. “…Why did you actually break up with her?”

Exhaling, Nax looked down at the floor, Kyra’s curious eyes halfway glancing at him through her white hair. “I told you earlier, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Not even a little? I don’t need all the details, honest.”

Nax rolled the idea around in his head for a hot second. “Fine.” he said, annoyed with Kyra’s prying. “I… caught her cheating. Dumped her right then and there.”

“Cheating? …Who?”

“…A friend. To his credit, we figured out she’d been playing us both and having a little “fun” on the side when she got bored of one of us. He dumped her ass, too.”

Their conversation was interrupted by Kelah and Tenan suddenly appearing behind them. “Whaddo we have here? Two little lovebirds hugging away from everyone else?” Kelah teased, jokingly punching the two of them in the shoulder, causing Kyra to immediately detach from Nax, rubbing her arm in embarrassment, and her face blood red, while Nax showed mild amusement with her teasing.

“Wanna make it three?” Nax replied, causing Kelah to burst out laughing, and Kyra to shrink herself even more.

“Hah! You’d have to get through the two brothers first.” she said, snickering, before sitting down next to them, her CA-87 and Bryar pistol clattering against the hull of the speeder, while Tenan jumped in the passenger seat with the E-Web control panel, carrying a shoulder mounted Z-6 rotary blaster and a Plex launcher, with ammo to spare, more than enough to crush the average person’s spine, but Tenan just lugged it around like it was nothing.

“Ey, you might want these.” Tenan suddenly said, tossing Nax, Kelah, and Kyra bandanas, which the former two used to cover their faces, while Kyra opted to throw on the mask she had been using since she met Nax.

“Thanks, Ten.” Kelah said graciously, before she sat down next to Kyra, whom she elbowed. “Hey, glad to see you didn’t sleep in like I expected, Em’d have a shitfit if you did. First mistake I made when I got here.” she said lightheartedly.

The redness in Kyra’s face had faded away, although nobody could tell, and she chuckled. “First impressions are everything. I’d hate to make the guy in charge angry.”

“Hahah, I don’t think anything more intelligent than that’s been said in this squad!” she chuckled, as Dev and Jax came into the garage, facing off against each other. “Speaking of things that aren’t intelligent…” Kelah snidely commented, topping it off with a quick laugh.

Valona quickly ran after Dev and Jax, seemingly from nowhere, carrying a bullpup slugthrower with a long barrel and square ballistic scope on her back, and threw the bickering brothers into the back seat of the unarmed Flash, before she hopped in the driver’s seat, and rolled over to face the armed Flash. She stared directly at Kyra, not even trying to be subtle about her feelings. It wasn’t an intense scowl like yesterday, more like a quiet, muted anger being restrained. Kelah noticed Val’s staring, and happily waved to her, seemingly oblivious to the murder-stare she was currently giving Kyra. Val gave Kelah a half-hearted wave in reply, and continued staring at Kyra.

Nax, evidently, also took notice of Val’s staring, and pulled Kyra closer to himself. Under the mask, Kyra felt her face heat up from blushing, while Val’s quiet anger turned back into the familiar scowl from yesterday. Nax leaned down to whisper into Kyra’s ear. “Ignore her.” he cautioned, his voice barely audible over the idling Flash. Val’s scowl simply intensified, and she turned her back to the rest of the squad.

Soon enough, Emel would arrive, taking control of the armed Flash, and leading them all out towards Bestine.

“Hey, Ten!” Kelah shouted over the roar of the Flash’s engines.

“What?” Tenan shouted back.

“What’s the difference between a Clone and a Stormie?”

“The Clone can see straight! You’ve told this one before, Kel!”

“Sonuva-!” Kelah cursed, kicking the front seats in frustration.

The joke, admittedly, did get Kyra and Nax to chuckle at least a bit. Stormtrooper helmets were notoriously hard to see out of, with the separate eyeslits making everything significantly more difficult. It made one wonder why the Empire switched to those from the old T-shaped visors to those things.

The convoy, if you could even call it that, had been travelling across the Tatooine deserts for a good while now. Probably… three hours? The suns’d been beating down on them for longer than they would have preferred, but hey, it’s not like they could just blow the suns up. Nax, who was used to working outside for extended periods of time with his brother and father, kind of just treated it like an extended day in the field, albeit without any physical work on his end.

Kyra, on the other hand, looked like she was on the verge of death, or at least, she acted like it, having slumped against Nax long ago. “Nax… I feel like I’m dying…” she moaned groggily, barely moving her body against him.

Kelah shook her, put her hand to Kyra’s forehead through the mask, and then shouted ahead. “Em! How far out are we? Kyra’s burning up over here!”

“Just over this next dune!” he shouted back, and they all felt the Flash physically lift up over the dune. Sure enough, the moisture farm was there, albeit it was more of a walled compound with several buildings inside, the most recognizable being some sort of large clocktower or silo. And right out near the front gate was…

Two squads of Stormtroopers, two troop transports, and an AT-ST. The two Flash speeders came to a nearly neck-breaking halt at the top of the sand dune. The Stormtroopers hadn’t noticed them, but before anyone could think of a plan of action, Val’s slugthrower discharged with a sharp, thunderous crack, and the commander in the AT-ST dropped dead, his blood and brains splattered against the roof of the walker. The stormtrooper squads immediately turned to the Flash speeders, and the group felt their collective blood run ice cold, even in Tatooine’s intense heat.

The speeders kicked up again, this time racing towards the back of the complex, opposite the stormtroopers. Everyone except for Emel and Kelah jumped out of their speeders, while Nax grabbed Kyra, picked her up bridal style, and ran into the complex, ducking into the nearest building to set her down. Huddled right near the entrance were mostly women and children. Nax gave them a quick glance, raised his finger to his mouth for them to keep quiet, and laid Kyra down near them. With both of his hands now free, he unslung the 17m, reached for his bandoleer, and grabbed the stick mag that he had pulled out mere hours ago. Jamming it into the magazine well, Nax lifted the Deecee, and bolted back out the door, blaster raised and ready to fire. Dev and Jax, who had pushed up, were located on opposite sides of the complex; Jax was on Nax’s side, while Dev was on the side with the tower, or whatever it was. Both of their TL-50s were firing away, cutting down four stormtroopers that had charged through. The three of them were about to push through the front entrance to outflank the stormtroopers, who they assumed had gone around the side to where the Flash speeders were.

The AT-ST clumsily crashing through the front entrance, however, put an end to those plans almost immediately. Narrowly avoiding the shower of dust and rubble by shielding his eyes and ducking away, Nax opened himself up again to see the AT-ST looking right at him. Frozen with fear, he stared right back, and was almost ready to die, if it weren’t for the fact that the sound of a Z-6 firing overwrote most of the noise in the area. Explosive blue bolts started pelting the “face” of the scout walker, and it turned away from Nax, deeming him less of a threat. The durasteel plating actually appeared to have been dented slightly from the force of the bolts.

“That fragging walker’s gonna chew us apart if we don’t do something about it NOW!” Jax shouted, gunning down another stormtrooper.

“Y’got any bright ideas, laserbrain?!” Dev replied, hunkering down in cover, keeping one eye on the walker, and one on the entrance.

Quickly looking at the walker, which now had its back turned to the three of them, Nax suddenly had a bright idea.

Well, maybe bright wasn’t the right word for it.

More like unnecessarily dangerous and incredibly stupid.

“I’m gonna board the walker.” Nax said simply, and the two brothers looked at him like he was insane. Before either of them could protest, Nax shouldered the Deecee, and ran up behind the walker’s right leg – a terrible idea in its own right considering the damned thing was still mobile, and jumped onto it. The weight of his gear weighed his jump height down, but Nax nonetheless managed to attach himself to the leg. It tried to drunkenly walk forward after Tenan, who was about to spin up the Z-6 again, but having noticed Nax, backed off into cover. Climbing forwards, Nax was just under the knee joint when he heard a shot ricochet. In the tower to his left, was Val, who had just shot out the drive engine, rendering the AT-ST immobile. There was a horrid, ugly grinding noise as the walker tried to move forward, and it sputtered out. Nax launched himself up onto the leg proper, catching himself. The crew were evidently aware of his existence now, and tried to turn the head to the side to shake him off, although Nax hung himself off the side of the leg, and another group of stormtroopers ran in, a few of them landing shots on the walker, with one hitting him in the foot, nearly causing Nax to fall.

Thinking quickly and trying to ignore the pain, Nax grabbed the laser cannons on the chin of the walker, and lifted himself up on top of them, hugging the walker’s face to keep himself stable. Working with what little room he had, Nax unholstered the Deecee, and reached for the commander’s viewport. Nearly about to fall off the cannons, Nax tried sticking the barrel of the blaster in, before he held the trigger down and didn’t let it go until the magazine ran dry. The recoil of firing the damned thing one-handed threatened to send Nax careening off to the side, but he held himself in place nonetheless. The screaming of the crew inside eventually stopped, as did the ricocheting blaster bolts, and the AT-ST stopped moving entirely. Nax dropped down from the knocked out walker, landed on his knees, and pulled the stick mag, taking a second one from the bandoleer and putting it in the magazine well. “Walker’s dead!” he shouted through the commotion. “We need to-“ Nax started, before another loud noise cut him off.

This time, between one of the houses and the tower Val was in, one of the transport vehicles crashed through the wall, sending rubble crashing down. It almost immediately opened fire at Nax with one of the side laser cannons, and he scrambled for cover with Tenan. Stormtroopers began pouring through the freshly made hole, blasters raised and firing wildly, striking the ground and buildings as they saw fit. A few of the special troopers, heavies and such, were quickly dropped by Val, their helmets shattering into pieces when the slugs entered the skulls of the poor bastards, leaving very little behind. Nax could see her crawl further back into cover, her position having been revealed. The stormtroopers, now with their attention turned to Val, were unceremoniously gunned down by Dev, Jax, Tenan, and Nax.

Only three stormtroopers remained within three seconds of sustained fire, before the transport shot a laser blast over Nax and Tenan’s heads. “Karabast!” Tenan shouted from stress, before throwing his Z-6 to the side and unholstering the Plex with minimal issue. “Dewback Three, Five, and Four! Stay the hell away from that APC if you don’t want to get blasted!” he shouted into his commlink. “Clear backblast!” Tenan shouted again, taking aim at the transport.

Thinking fast, Nax rolled behind the building they had been using for cover, and narrowly felt the backblast of the rocket skim his feet. There was one loud explosion, and then a split second later, a second, louder explosion. “Transport’s down!” Tenan shouted into his comm, and Dev and Jax fired three quick shots at the remaining stormtroopers. “We need a bodycount!” Tenan yelled into the comm.

“Three, five, ten… seventeen!” Nax quickly counted. “We’ve got seventeen bodies!”

Tenan looked back at him. “There were two squads! Where are the other three?” he asked. Their question was immediately answered by the sound of the second transport firing up. “Blast!” Tenan shouted angrily, as the roaring and thunderous noise from the transport’s engine slowly faded. “Dewback One and Two, one of the transports is escaping!”

“Copy, on the move.” Emel’s voice cracked through the comm.

“Kel, man the E-Web! One of those Imp APCs is trying to get away!”

Kelah said nothing and jumped into the passenger seat, readying the E-Web. A quick camera feed appeared on the dash from the barrel of the blaster, and the Flash shot forward, chasing after the transport. It wasn’t exactly hard to spot, after all, it was a transport, the sand cloud it was leaving behind was huge.

Grabbing hold of the stick that controlled the E-Web, Kelah eased it so that it was aiming just in front of the transport to account for bolt travel time, and she laid into the transport. The E-Web happily blasted away at the thin armor plating, chewing through it like there was no tomorrow. The side of the transport began to smoke, first light grey, then slowly growing darker, eventually fully going black. As the smoke darkened and thickened, the E-Web’s barrel visibly heated up, the power pack’s overheat warning sound growing louder and higher pitched the longer she kept the trigger depressed.

Deciding that the E-Web had enough, Kelah drew her CA-87. “Drive me closer! I want to hit them my blaster!” she shouted, waving it around in the air. Emel looked at her like she was crazy, before begrudgingly getting them closer to the smoking part of the transport, minding the waving and general instability of the repulsorlifts. Kelah hopped up on the dash, aimed at where the smoke was coming one handed, and fired. The shock blaster kicked her arm back, and actually caused her to fall back into her seat, but it had the desired effect: the troop transport was now spinning out of control.

When she sat back up, the transport had now crashed into the sand, a burning, damaged mess. Emel brought the speeder to a halt, and the two of them jumped out, blasters at the ready. Running up to the side of the transport, Emel counted down from three, and they breached together. Emel immediately shot the lone dazed stormtrooper in the head once, killing him instantly, before going up to the cab, where Kelah heard two more shots. “Clear.” Emel yelled from the front, calm, cool, and collected. “Let’s get back to the compound.” Emel said, before yanking the storage device from the stormtrooper’s helmet, crushing it and two of its twins in his fist, and walking out, Kelah in tow.

They failed to hear the internal commlink go off. ''“Echo Two, are you there? Report on the compound immediately. Echo Two, respond!”''

Kelah and Emel had both returned, pulling their Flash into the main courtyard of the compound. The two of them reunited with Tenan, Nax, Dev, and Jax. It would’ve been all well and good, had Tenan not spun Nax around and forcibly grabbed hold of him. “What the hell were you thinking?!”

“Thinking what?”

Tenan breathed in deeply. '“CLIMBING ON THE WALKER! I COULD HAVE SHOT YOU!”' he bellowed at Nax, causing all eyes in the squad, and even a few from the civilians who were leaving their homes, to land on him.

“Wait, Nax did ''what now''?” Kelah asked, partially amazed, partially shocked from the sheer stupidity of that stunt.

“Ten didn’t stutter, Kel. Nax – swear to the Suns that I’m not spewing bantha fodder – climbed onto the walker and killed the crew by shooting into the viewports.” Dev said, crossing his heart. “In the middle of the firefight, too.”

Kelah just stared at Nax, her expression blank. Emel moved in front of her, causing Nax’s attention to switch to him. “Nax, while you did get results, what you pulled could’ve ended badly for us.” he said in a far more respectful tone. “You could’ve gotten shot by Tenan and blown up with the walker, maybe dying with him. This is a war we’re fighting; not a race for martyrdom.”

Nax nodded his head out of respect. “Yes, sir.”

Valona came walking out of the tower, shielding her eyes from the suns. '''“Speaking of things that could’ve gotten us shot…”''' Tenan growled angrily, scowling at Val.

“Val, under normal circumstances, I’d say I was upset with you.” Emel carefully said, sounding more like a disappointed father than a commanding officer. “However, I’m beyond furious with you. By engaging that walker, you could have gotten us all killed.” Emel finished, switching back into a quiet, angry commanding officer.

Val just dismissively rolled her eyes, holding her rifle close to her body. One of the moisture farmers came out and began to talk to Emel, presumably the guy in charge, so Nax took that as his cue to leave, heading into the building where Kyra had been left.

Once inside, and suddenly feeling significantly cooler, he casually walked up to where one of the older women was tending to Kyra. “How is she?” he asked, looking down at her unconscious body.

“Bad, dear. She’s suffering from heatstroke – we can help treat her condition, but it’ll take several days.”

“How long?”

“Oh, I don’t know… two, three days?”

Nax frowned and crouched down. Just then, Kyra stirred. She half opened her eyes, looked at Nax, and briefly smiled, giving his arm a small squeeze, before she fell back into unconsciousness. “I’ll talk to our squad leader about staying here.”

The woman gave him a warm smile. “Thank you, dear. We’ll take good care of your friend.”

Emel didn’t need much convincing; he’d already intended on staying at the compound for a few days, mostly to help with the damage to the compound as an apology. Right now, Nax was sitting in the tower where Val had been sniping out of earlier, which actually turned out to be a storage silo. There was a big transparent sliding door or something that was at the top floor. It didn’t lead to anything, it was just there. Val had seemingly totally ignored its existence, as there was a big gaping hole where she had been sniping from that was letting the air in. Smooth.

The stormtrooper bodies had already been burned, their evidence destroyed hours ago. The walker and transports were, unfortunately, still around. They’d need to be dismantled – or reclaimed, and soon.

Hearing footsteps, Nax’s hand was already on the Deecee’s grip when he turned around. It was Val, carrying her rifle by the carrying handle up the spiral staircase. He turned back to looking out on the vast desert, but didn’t move his hand off the blaster.

Val took a seat on the opposite end of the window, dropping her rifle by the chair.

Nax totally ignored her existence, but he felt her gazing at him. Eventually, Nax’s arm grew tired of holding on to the Deecee, so he let it go, resting his arm on his right leg, balling his fist up.

“Nax. Can I ask you something?” Val meekly asked.

“I can think of about a hundred reasons why I should answer no, and about a thousand for why I should tell you to eat shit and die.” Nax said harshly, not even removing his gaze from the dunes. “No.”

Val suddenly appeared hurt, a stark contrast to how she initially acted seeing her ex for the first time in years. She opted to not say anything, and instead began to disassemble her rifle for cleaning.

“I did hear about what you tried with Kyra.” Nax said, blank and emotionless. “I don’t give two shits what you think she is or whatever caused you to go after her – but if you as much as lay a hand on her I swear to the Suns I’ll shove so many scattergun shells up your ass you’ll wish you stayed with You-Know-Who.” Nax threatened, before looking over at Val. “That’s a promise, Val. Do not test me.”

Val, for the first time in the past two days, looked like she was actually giving serious consideration to someone else’s advice, but she said nothing, and returned to cleaning her rifle. She had overwatch duty tonight, but the thing that would keep popping up in her mind would be regret.

Regret for what happened.

Regret for what she did.

Regret for hurting him.

Nax would later go back down and join the rest of the squad for dinner and rest.

"So, Lex, that's what my day's like, most of the time." Thel said, exhausted, but content.

"Really? Thought it'd be more... interesting, I guess." she replied with a smile.

Bemused, Thel cracked a smile. "Oh, don't get me wrong - it does get interesting, like this one time I owed Jabba the Hutt so much I nearly started selling off my organs to pay fo-excuse me." Thel began to regale, before being interrupted by a male Trandoshan, a male and female Duros, and a male human. The Trando was wearing some sort of green flightsuit with white trim, the Duros had dusters and wide-brimmed hats, while the human simply had a brown duster and bandoleer. "Shop's closed, sorry. I can take an order for tomorrow if you need one." Thel offered.

The human and Duros looked visibly disappointed, while the Trando just crossed his arms. "That'sss... very unfortunate." he hissed. "We'll come back tomorrow, then." As the Trandoshan turned to leave, Thel was about to collect the remainder of his stock, only for the Trandoshan to stop and turn back. "Wait a sssecond, you sssmell... familiar..." he hissed again, referring to Lexi. They didn't know who she was since she was wearing a mask, and her clothes were long enough to hide the fact that she was a Zeltron, but the two of them were on edge regardless.

The Trandoshan sniffed her again. "Very nice ssslave you have here, my friend.  Veeery nice ... How much for her?" the Trandoshan said, barely making an effort to conceal what he knew

"Not for sale." Thel said, rejecting the offer.

The Trandoshan shrugged, annoyed. "I tried to be diplomatic. Unfortunately, you have some property of ours." he hissed out, disappointed, before he drew two stun blasters, quickly armed them, and shot both Lexi and Thel, stunning them. "Cuff these two." he directed the male Duros and the human, before pointing at the female Duros. "You, contact Kaz and let her know we found one of the slaves." he commanded, satisfied with himself.