Rebel Roleplayers Alliance

Volar's Story - part 12

In less than one stipa, Volar was in the water. His armor sealed automatically as soon as his head went under the water. Knowing he had twenty tipas of compressed air, he quickly swam away from the shaft above. When Jocham dropped into the water, the whole squad assembled. Jocham looked at his datapad, pointed, and began swimming. The rest followed using the thermal imagers built into their visors, Starla using a hand held glowtube. The underground cavern quickly gave way to a narrow tube. As it narrowed, the flow of the water quickened. Volar felt himself being pushed toward the small opening. Although he did not feel the cold water at all, protected as he was by his armor and body glove, he could see Starla was shivering. Her body glove, alone, was not enough. Soon he was swept off his feet and taken by the current. A tipa later, he emerged into a pond or lake of some kind.

The squad climbed out of the water, manually reset their air settings to 'unfiltered', and looked around. It was a lake, and a fairly large one at that, surrounded by a forest in a deep valley. Looking up, they could see the mountain tops all around them. About two tsan to the north was one particular mountain with smoke rising from it. Invader assault shuttles appeared to be landing into the burning trees while TIE fighters circled. Jocham looked at his datapad, pointed, and started walking away from the mountain. Without any orders, the squad dispersed and moved in a line, each man following the man in front of him. As Volar looked about, he noticed Starla was highlighted red in his visor while the rest of the squad was highlighted green. Because she was not in armor she had no IFF transponder. They would have to remember that if they found themselves in a fight.

After twenty five tipas, Jocham signaled a squad halt. Volar looked over at Starla and found her staring intently at the bag he was carrying (which contained her weapon). When she noticed him watching, she quickly looked away. Volar could imagine she felt uncomfortable being escorted by armed soldiers who didn't trust her, to a place she didn't know. His musings were interrupted by the sound of scramjet engines flying directly overhead. Now there was a sound he hadn't heard in a long time; scramjets - not ion engines. That was Lazaveltian technology.

The whole squad watched as four aircraft flew toward the mountain no more than 20 paces above the trees. Four TIE fighters exploded as the scramjets leapt from the trees into the middle of the Imperial craft. Without his visor, Volar would not have been able to see the Lazaveltian weapons. These scramjets were armed with high energy lasers mounted in a rotating turret. As the TIE fighters maneuvered to bring their weapons to bear, their attackers destroyed several more. In three tipas all twelve TIE fighters, three of the nine assault shuttles, and two Lazaveltian scramjets had been destroyed. The other two scramjets, one of them trailing smoke, escaped from this lightning raid by flying among the mountains. Having lost their fighter protection, the assault shuttles also withdrew.

Starla yelled her approval and her eyes gleamed behind her shaking fist as she watched the Imperial craft being destroyed. Volar turned and covered her mouth. She quickly stopped yelling but jumped up and down, all but dancing, and shook her fist some more. She smiled a wicked smile as the squad began walking away again. Volar considered her cold eyes and heartless smile. He felt no joy at the killing he witnessed. Only a pronounced sadness; a sense of waste. It was all so pointless. Why did the Invaders have to bring violence? Why did anyone? Volar had been taught the holy writings since he was a child. They said there was only one acceptable reason for violence; self defense. Maybe the Invaders didn't read the holy writings. Maybe Starla's people didn't either.

After another twenty five tipas or so, the point man gave the signal to halt. The entire squad knelt and faced in opposite directions, their weapons at the ready. The point man signaled for the Second to come forward. After a few stipas, the Second signaled for Khunta the Comtech to move forward. Starla touched, then looked questioningly at Volar. Volar could only shrug his shoulders. A few stipas later, Khunta resumed his place in the line and the Second led the squad in a different direction at a running pace. Volar did not know why. He didn't know the point man had seen an unknown electronic device. He wasn't told the comtech believed it was a sensor of some type; that the Invaders probably knew where they were. But Volar trusted his leaders and his squad mates. If the second thought it was necessary to run, then Volar knew it was necessary to run. But they could not run fast enough.

Aboard the Star Destroyer, an Imperial lieutenant snapped to attention before his commander and handing him a datapad, reported "General, a small group of enemy soldiers has appeared outside of the battle area. Comscan reports the rebel pilot is with them." The Imperial general turned to his command staff and ordered "Drop the capture team at these coordinates". The reply came back "Capture team dispatched. They will arrive on scene in eight minutes." A different officer leaned toward the general and said quietly "You were right again. They infiltrated past our entire attack force. I wish I knew how they did that." The general replied quietly "Perhaps you can ask them. Bring her in alive. I don't care about the rest."

As the Lazaveltians ran, Starla had a difficult time keeping up. Here were a dozen men and women in full battle armor and they were outrunning her. As the assault shuttle flew right over them, she saw several two meter black spheres drop from each side of the craft. She knew these were Imperial war droids...fully armored...very tough. What she didn't know was that they were already programmed with her image. The war droids opened just before they hit the ground; their two legs driven 15 centimeters into the rocky soil by the weight of the impact. Four arms opened out of each sphere; the two inner arms ending in mechanical mitten style graspers, the two outer arms ending in repeating blasters. The droids opened fire as soon as they stood up. Volar dove behind a large rock as blaster fire tore into everything around him. Starla was already laying behind the large rock yelling something at him in her language. Volar reached into his side case and handed her, her blaster pistol. She immediately turned and opened fire on the droids. Her teeth showing as she snarled at them.

A cacophony of blaster hits struck the rock as he activated his electronic sights. Placing his weapon to the side of the rock, he remained completely behind it. Looking at the visual displayed upon his armor's visor - the visual that came from the carbine's sight - he could see one of them. He fired his carbine several times in quick succession. His laser struck the droid every time. Other than the droid shifting it's fire to Volar, he observed no other effect. Volar switched to high power mode and fired one shot at the droid. This time he saw his laser energy vaporize a hole through the droid's armor, and out it's other side. Other Lazaveltians scored several more laser hits upon that droid and it fell silent, it's arms lowering to the ground inactive. The amount of blaster fire around Volar was tremendous. It was accurate and it was continuous. Only that rock separated him from the Creator-Sustainor. And Volar knew it. He couldn't move to help his wounded squad mates as they were hit by blaster fire. So, he threw a grenade in the direction of another droid. After the grenade detonated, he placed one high power shot into that droid. He saw several blaster shots strike the droid and it rolled over backwards. Then two things happened at the same time: Volar's visor lost the image coming from the carbine's sight and his hand was thrown back against him.

Looking down at his hand he saw the armored plate covering the back of his hand was gone. There was also blood everywhere, but it didn't really hurt as bad as it looked. Before the pain could fully register, he focused his gift on his own hand, shutting down the pain that would come when the shock wore off. His carbine was O.K., but the cable was severed. As he reached into his side pouch for a spare cable, a droid stepped through the foliage not three paces from him. Volar threw himself on top of Starla to protect her with his armor. In that half thought of time, he thought: although he would be killed, she might be able to down the droid with her blaster pistol. Starla turned toward the sound, felt the impact of Volar on top of her and fired her blaster. But the droid's mechanical servos were faster. It shot them both repeatedly. Electric pain wracked their bodies as everything went black.

Source:

Mark Nielipinski

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