The Fog of War/Part 20

"Leave him," Tirien commanded as Narasi looked at the fallen Acolyte, who was struggling up to his hands and knees.

"If he—"

"There's no time."

Aldayr wondered if that was shorthand for don't cut down a defenseless man, but he didn't bother asking. His side still throbbed, and he pressed a hand to it to stanch the bleeding. Narasi caught the movement, and her eyes widened as red seeped through his Jedi robes. "What happened?"

"Vandak had two of his Anzat goons with him," Aldayr said through his teeth as they ran up the stairs; every other step was a spear of pain in his ribs. "I got through them, but it was close."

"Where's Master Kadych?" Tirien asked, pushing open a door to the main floor and stepping over a Sith soldier's body.

"He took out Darth Vaszas and some Human, but Vandak stabbed him in the back," Aldayr reported. "I think he might be dead."

Narasi sucked in a breath through her nose and Tirien grimaced. "Where?"

"Legislative assembly room, second floor off the staircase. I'll show you—"

Tirien stopped in the front hall, and Aldayr and Narasi stopped with him. "Both of you clear our path out."

"What?!" Aldayr asked, dumbfounded. "But my master—"

"Sent you to get me," Tirien interrupted, starting up the stairs. "You're already wounded, Aldayr, Vandak will kill you. The resistance outside can't be holding on by much, and when we take Vandak out we'll need to leave quickly.  Comm Slejux, then cut down any soldiers and Acolytes out there."

Narasi squared her shoulders. "On it, Master."

Aldayr gritted his teeth. "Watch out, the Togorian's in there somewhere, and I think he's still alive."

Tirien nodded from the landing and vanished down the hall toward the battle. Narasi wiped the sweat from her face with her sleeve. "Come on, we gotta go."

Aldayr held his wrist comlink to his lips. "Slejux, it's Aldayr."

"Hello Aldayr, how are you?" the Melitto's buzzing voice came back.

"Tirien and Mali are fighting Vandak, I think Master Kadych is dead," he summarized. "Narasi and I are going to help the resistance so we can extract."

The line was quiet for a moment. "I'm on my way to you with the hostages."

Aldayr limped toward the front doors, Narasi at his side. "They'll be okay," she said. "You saw what Tirien can do."

Aldayr had, and he was duly impressed; the Pantoran might spend a bit too much time trying not to fight, but when he finally got started he was terrifying. But Aldayr had caught glimpses of Mali battling Darth Vandak through the smoke of the assembly room, and he knew that Vandak's Anzat minions were pale, cheap imitators compared to their master. And Tirien and Mali had already battled through a life-and-death duel each already.

"Aldayr…" Narasi said.

"Yeah, they'll be fine," he snapped.

"No, Aldayr the battle…"

"Yeah, I'm going."

Narasi hissed in frustration, grabbed him by the sleeve of his real arm, and jerked him to a halt. "Stop! Aldayr, listen.  The battle…"

He grimaced, but listened, and after a moment he felt a chill. "I don't hear anything."

"No," Narasi agreed, swallowing as she took the lightsaber hilt from her belt. "Me either."

They opened the front doors side-by-side, lightsaber hilts in hand, and found a Sith battalion waiting for them. Row after row of Sith troopers trained their blaster rifles on the door, and a pair of one-man walkers clomped into position in the rear. A trio of Acolytes in dark armor stood to one side; a blonde Near-Human of some sort strode forward.

"Lay down your arms, Jedi," she called. "Your Milagroan friends left you to die. There's no point taking them up on the invitation."

"No…" Narasi whispered.

Aldayr didn't want to believe it either, but remembered Mali telling him once that a battlefield will tell you a lot if you listen to what it's saying. He looked over the square and saw a few spots of carbon scorch where grenades had gone off, but far fewer than the number of grenades he had seen the resisters carrying. There were a handful of dead Sith soldiers, too, but even outnumbered the resistance should've managed more casualties than these.

"Guess we wore out our welcome," Aldayr commented bitterly.

Narasi's jaw trembled, but then she wiped her eyes and activated her blade. "I'm not going down without a fight."

Maybe she was a kindred spirit after all. Aldayr smiled, held his lightsaber out parallel with the ground, and ignited both blades.

The Sith Acolyte rolled her eyes, then gestured in dismissal toward the door.

It was like a tidal wave of blasterfire, like seeing an entire flock of birds swoop toward them at once. The two Padawans gave ground immediately, retreating inside the doors as the front walls began to disintegrate. Aldayr sensed a flash of pain beside him and called over the cacophony, "You hit?!"

"It's not bad!" Narasi yelled back.

They reflected fire from the vestibule until plaster started to chip off the ceiling, then retreated inside. Together they levitated a stone sculpture off its plinth and hurled it toward the door as the first scouts charged in, crushing half a dozen. The survivors shot at them automatically, and the Padawans turned the fire back, scoring a few more hits. Aldayr looked around, but they were out of statues, and the Sith were recovering their courage.

Pounding footsteps drew his attention, and he was baffled to see a herd of panicked, naked, middle-aged Humans staggering down the stairs, a few afforded the modesty of a blanket or the lightsabered uniform shirt of a Sith officer. They goggled at the sight of two Jedi, blaster bolts streaking by. Something dropped past, and Aldayr looked over the railing in time to see Slejux land lightly in the atrium. He held his green lightsaber before his body, and he radiated tranquility so deep Aldayr felt more relaxed just sensing it. The Sith soldiers advanced toward him warily.

"Please don't," he implored.

They did.

Seven of them fit in what remained of the interior doors, and they all fired at once. Aldayr was used to Mali's broad, powerful movements, and for an instant his heart leapt into his throat, because he thought Slejux was just accepting death. And yet none of the seven shots touched him; his lightsaber darted here and there, and he twisted his body just so, and everything missed. Six of the Sith soldiers stared; the seventh fell down face-first, smoke pouring from a hole in his chest.

The Sith fired, and fired again, frantically pulling their triggers as fast as they were able. Slejux moved, twisted and turned, deflected and blocked. The Melitto remained calm and graceful; the Sith fell one after another. Blaster smoke and the radioactive fog of burst blaster bolts misted the air, and Slejux straightened, settling back into a patient Soresu guard. The last Sith soldier took one look, threw down his blaster, and ran out the door.

"Come along," Slejux called.

He strode out the door, and Aldayr turned to the hostages. "Come on, we've gotta move."

"He can't take on that whole battalion!" Narasi said. "…can he?"

"One problem at a time!" Aldayr advised. The smell of smoke was not dissipating, and he remembered the fire in the assembly room. Had it gotten out of control before the fire suppression system kicked in?

Mali…but there was no time.

"Go, go!" he told the hostages, waving his hand down the stairs to encourage them. Narasi took the point, but Aldayr saw her holding her hip with a grimace. He trailed the last hostages, averting his eyes from the view, then joined Narasi to lead them out into the square.

One of the Sith Acolytes was on her knees five meters away, howling as she clutched the stumps of her hands to her breastplate. Another lay on his back, dead eyes staring up at the sky. The blonde woman alone survived, and she had a panicked look as she hammered uselessly at Slejux's guard. The Melitto did not seem impatient or even particularly hurried as he backed her up slowly across the marble flagstones. She lurched back and sent a Force push his way; Slejux gestured as if calling the Force into himself, then sent his hand back like a receding wave, and the Acolyte went flying.

She hit the ground hard, bounced, and rolled to a stop at the head of her troops. Aldayr's heart sank. Even with Slejux's help, they had cut three hundred Sith down to about two hundred and eighty Sith.

"May the Force be with us," Slejux said, and Aldayr could feel him channeling it into himself.

He looked at Narasi. "If I have to go…I guess there's worse ways than going with you."

She managed a half-smile. "Look who's Mr. Personality now that we're about to get shot to ribbons."

"Yeah, you never know what will—"

Peh-peeo, peh-peeo.

For a second Aldayr thought the walkers had fired, and he waited for the fire to burn him away into the Force. Then he saw the walkers explode into shrapnel, one after another, and all the Sith soldiers turn skyward at once. A wave of panic swept the ranks.

A freighter banked into a tight turn, its double gun continuing to fire. The gun turret was made for shooting ships, and it carved a burning swath of chaos into the Sith ranks. As they fired uselessly at it, it dropped hard toward the flagstones, crunching through a pillar that had survived so far and dropping its boarding ramp to scrape along the ground.

"Get in here, NOW!" snapped a vaguely familiar woman's voice from an intercom.

"Move!" Aldayr told the hostages. "Move, move, move!"

As he and Narasi pushed them toward the ramp, the blonde Acolyte cocked her arm and threw her lightsaber. It whirled through the air toward the ship, but then altered course and came down neatly into Slejux's hand. He cut it in half, then turned his faceless head toward her as if waiting for her answer. She glared, but fell back into the ranks of her followers.

Slejux retreated under fire as Narasi got stragglers aboard. An old man was plodding toward the ramp; Aldayr wrapped him in his blanket, then hoisted the man bodily with his cybernetic arm and carried him aboard. Slejux brought up the rear and Aldayr called, "We're in!"

"About time," the female voice complained; sticking his head around a corner toward the cockpit, Aldayr saw the short haircut and placed the pirate Nal Chun. "We're gone."

"We can't be!" Narasi said. "My master's still in there!"

"And mine," Aldayr added.

"They're bringing up rockets," Nal fired back. "We got one lucky run, we can't take that kind of barrage."

"We can't leave them, either!" Narasi insisted.

"Kid, if you want to get out, now's the time, but we're going."

Narasi stamped her foot in frustration. "They just left us here to die!"

"I'm sorry," Kadelle Chun's voice came up from the gun turret. "Jossi was afraid this was gonna happen. We can drop you with the resistance before we burn sky, but you might be better taking your chances with us."

"We said kill the Sith or leave Milagro," Slejux said, laying a hand on Narasi's shoulder. "I think we must do both."

"But…" Narasi's eyes widened, and she bolted toward the cockpit. Aldayr pressed a hand to his side and followed; his wound was bleeding again. "Can you drop us somewhere else?!"

"We're not a taxi service!" Nal complained. She leaned away from Narasi with a distasteful look.

"Just one stop," Narasi pleaded.

"Where?!"

"About a hundred klicks south."