Since returning from Coruscant, the next few weeks we're quite eventful. While there had been no major battles or immediate crises scaring everyone, there has been progress. For Eila, it looked like the Empire was starting to listen since when they returned from Coruscant, Pina and Bozes left for home and eventually sent a courier that some pro-peace, neutral, and pro-war Senators wanted to meet. Releasing Count Formal, his associates, and the first five hundred soldiers must have moved them. The details on the meeting hadn't been finalized yet as Pina hadn't sent another message.
While that issue was being waited on to be resolved, the refugees seemed to have been spreading the word about them. After a while, merchants, refugees, and others citizens from across Falmart started showing up at the front of the base looking for dragon scales, protection from bandits or some other reason. Quickly running out of space to house people within the base even though the base was expanded a few times to deal with this problem, the people decided to start making a town near the base. The town rapidly grew to the point it needed a variety of services such as a police force. Rory eagerly volunteered for the police force and pretty much everyone was hoping it would serve as an outlet to any aggression she might have and it was certainly working since after a few incidents, no one dared to cross her. Although, newcomers we're expected to cause trouble just so Rory wouldn't be bored.
With a new town near the base and a growing government structure within it, the Republic was taking a more hands off approach when it came to refugees seeking asylum. While they would provide some supplies, mostly quality of life materials, and security, the town was expected to take care of itself and whoever came by. The quality of life items though usually flew off the shelves with datapads being among the popular items which was causing some bookstore owners and printing press companies to be fearful of their futures. The clones usually went to the town's bar to have some fun when they were off-duty since it would take too long to go to 79's on Coruscant. Sometimes, Eila would join them too when the day was done.
Not everything was ideal though as there had been some incidents with people coming to the base. Despite a call for a meeting, there have been a few times the troopers had caught the Empire's spies trying to nab some technology or weapon. Likely to reverse engineer it. Unfortunately for them, anyone entering or leaving the base was scanned and it was pretty obvious a person was a spy when they would give the flimsy reason of trying to find the refresher while lingering near the weapons depot. Even in the town, some spies would try to steal the 'quality of life' items but they never got past the shopkeeper since the shop also had a scanner at the door. They eventually tried stealing it from someone who had already bought it but they wouldn't get very far as Rory had very sharp eye for thieves and people leaving the town were also scanned at its gates. It quickly became policy that technology from the Republic wouldn't leave the town or base. The spies who tried to run or foolishly fight when they were caught usually condemned themselves to Rory requiring a cleaning droid and troopers to block off the area to shield children's eyes.
As for exploration, it was certainly booming with Recon Team Five personally running the researchers from the University of Coruscant around the continent. The researchers constantly bombarded Eila with communiques of what they were finding, even though most of it was hardly remarkable like finding significant amounts of sulfur near a volcano or seeing some previously unseen humanoid species to the Republic. She eventually started ignoring their messages and sent them directly back to Coruscant to bother whoever had to read them over there.
The recon teams themselves were finally getting an upgrade. Because the Senate was willing to spend more on the expedition, the modified BARC speeders were getting replaced with the brand new TX-130T fighter tanks that had only recently left the Rothana Heavy Engineering foundries to replace the aging TX-130 Saber-class tanks. Since the T-variants were larger, they could carry the gear needed better than the modified speeders could. Additionally, five people can fit in the tank, so it also reduced the number of speeders needed from nine down to four for a squad. It also carried concussion missiles, dual heavy laser cannons, and a thermal detonator/smoke launcher which satisfied Fordo's recommendation for heavier firepower. Wrench would be disappointed when these tanks rolled out since his speeders were getting scrapped and to compensate, out of the twelve AT-TEs they had, six were going back home to be used elsewhere along with the same number of LAAT/c's. All of the AV-7 artillery guns were also being taken back. Although, Wrench would replace the beam cannon turret of the TX-130 with a heavy repeating blaster as the enemies they had so far run across liked to use swarming tactics. The beam cannon had a lag time between shots which could prove costly when multiple enemies are charging the tank. This was a much needed upgrade since before these tanks began rolling out, the fire dragon hadn't remained idle since its arm was blown off. It was now attacking the recon teams in various locations all over the continent, making it difficult to pin down where it was resting. Despite the recon teams efforts to kill it with rocket launchers whenever they encountered it, they had lost thirteen troopers to the beast.
The aerial forces were also getting an upgrade as so far, the only air vehicles they had were the LAATs. Using the extra space created because of the housing problem, newly brought in Y-Wings, V-Wings, and ARC-170s now filled that gap. Captain Koll and his fellow pilots were particularly happy with this as a wide blue sky without droid fighters to challenge them was a liberating feeling to them. To them, it felt like they were flying in the safe skies of Kamino without the persistent rain clouds. Although, the pilots would be given the job of acting as advanced scouts to a point of interest before a recon team would take a closer look. In addition, someone back home also thought up of the wild idea of constructing Venator-class Star Destroyers in orbit to bolster their presence in the Special Region, possibly explore other worlds, and find out if they were even in their own galaxy. The base and the surrounding field around Alnus wasn't big enough to accommodate a ground-based shipyard so the first thing to construct would be the orbital shipyard. It would be estimated that in six months, the orbital platform would be completed as well as at least a trio of Star Destroyers ready. With that ambitious plan, materials and construction droids had been coming in non-stop since the proposal was approved.
Casually throwing another one of the researcher's messages aside to be transmitted later and moving on to reading the prevailing mythology in Falmart provided by Lelei, Fordo and Wrench entered Eila's office. Wrench would drop off a datapad and explain, "General, RT1 is ready to leave for the Blue Sea."
"Alright, send them off. They're to deliver reports every 12 hours."
"Yes, General."
Fordo would be the next to speak up and drop off another datapad, "General, Rory handled another situation in town today. Here's her report."
"Okay." After a pause, "Did she kill anyone?"
"No. But I'm sure the punk she kicked in a rather sensitive spot certainly wished she had."
Eila gave a faint chuckle and thanked the both of them. Despite thanking them, Fordo and Wrench hadn't budged. Noticing this, she spoke up, "Something wrong?"
"General, Ramius is becoming concerned about Tuka." Fordo said.
"Oh?" Eila said and raising an eyebrow.
"Since the town started up, she's been wandering around everyday looking for someone." Fordo continued, "Ramius is becoming concerned about her mental state."
"General, we should bring her in. Have her talk about her problems to us so we can help her." Wrench said.
Eila began thinking about Tuka. So far, whenever she had read Tuka through the Force, it was telling her that Tuka's mind was confused and in denial. Tuka's mind was refusing to accept an undeniable truth. Eila asked Fordo how he had been treating her since this issue had come up under his watch.
"Treating her, General? I've treated her no different than I have with Lelei or Rory or any of the other refugees. I help them out where I can. I see to their needs when they ask for it. I haven't really given Tuka any special treatment. I actually told Ramius before to simply wait and have Tuka come to us with her problems but it's already been a few months since we rescued her and she hasn't."
"That's why I'm saying we should bring her in. She needs to confront whatever is bothering her." Wrench repeated.
"Wrench, she'll probably move further away from us if we force her. But, have you noticed anything particular about her behavior, Fordo?" Eila said.
"Hmm, well I did hear her mention about a 'father' a couple of times."
"Father?"
"Yes, General. There have been a few times she's asked people if they had seen her father. The people in question would mention that after asking them, she would get all embarrassed asking about it and then skitter away."
"Hmm, there were no other elves when you rescued her from her village, correct?"
"I'm quite certain. The men couldn't find anyone else in her village or in the immediate area. The place was completely decimated. Is there anything you could advise?"
Eila wasn't quite sure what to do herself with Tuka. It was quite obvious that her father was dead based on the information available. For Eila, she had been trained to accept death as a natural part of life. For anyone to die, they shouldn't be missed. Their life should instead be celebrated now that they were one with the Force. Ultimately, she thought that Tuka would readily reject that idea and create a fantasy where her father is alive to cling to. She sighed, "Unfortunately, I'm not sure what to do. I guess we can continue to wait for Tuka to come to us. Let's just hope it doesn't take an eternity."
While the two men nodded and left the room, hearing herself say that statement though reinforced Eila's doubts about her choice. She preferred confronting a problem directly as Wrench suggested, but she wasn't really sure how Tuka would react to being forced to face the fact that her father is dead. When it came to any problems concerning the well-being of a person, Master Yoda would usually advise to trust in the Force to guide them. At the moment, Eila was betting on that.
Yao Ha Dushi panted heavily, having walked for weeks to reach Alnus to seek the aid of the white armored men with green markings. She and the elders of her village had heard the rumor about them that they were the ones who wounded the fire dragon. The same fire dragon that was now hunting her people by torching their homes and eating her brethren. Approaching the town near the base which had a sign on its entrance calling itself 'Town of Alnus', Yao wandered around trying to find those men. To her displeasure, she would instead be solicited by perverts or muggers. She handled them well enough by herself once those degenerates realized they were totally out of her league and she had managed to get their coin pouches in exchange. Tossing up another coin pouch from another pervert who ran away from her, she suddenly heard someone call out to her.
"Hey you!"
She turned around to see two young women, one wearing a black and red dress while holding a large halberd and the other was a siren. She approached the pair cautiously.
"Yes?" She answered.
"Seems you've been causing trouble around here." The girl said.
"Oh, what kind of trouble?"
"This gentleman here says you stole his money."
From the corner of Yao's eye, she saw a man she had met earlier with a black eye pointing at her and accusing her of being a thief. She wasn't going to take his accusation willingly.
"This man is not being completely truthful. He offered me money for sexual favors. When I refused, he tried to attack me so I defended myself and took his pouch for good measure."
"Oh?" The girl eyed the man with suspicion.
The man twitched nervously but continued his tirade that Yao was guilty. Yao began to argue with him while also throwing insults such as mocking his manhood. The girl sighed at the little spat she was seeing and called to her partner.
"Myuute, restrain them both. We'll bring them to the clones."
Before Yao and the man could protest, Myuute had muttered a spell and confined the two using wind magic. Yao and the man couldn't escape as the air swirling around was so strong it actually hurt to stick their hands into it. They had to walk with the wind or risk getting whipped by it.
Being brought to the brig, Yao at first thought of testing the ray shield confining her since she didn't know what the translucent wall was. Luckily for her, the man who was brought in with her and put in the cell next door tried to hit the shield while whining that he was wrongly imprisoned. He got electrocuted into unconsciousness for his trouble. Pulling her hand away, she was immediately jubilant at the sight of the white armored men with green markings enter the room with the girl who took her in earlier and another girl who looked to be a mage.
"Hey! Hey!" She called to them, "You're the men the rumors are about, right? Please, I need your help!"
The men stared at her until one of them talked quietly with the two girls with them. Eventually, one of them approached her.
"I'm Captain Fordo of the Grand Army of the Republic. And you are?"
"Yao. Yao Ha Dushi. My clan live in the Schwarz Forest. I was sent on a quest to seek your help"
"Help? What kind of help?"
"To slay the fire dragon."
Yao could tell Fordo was certainly interested in helping her because he immediately lowered the ray shield and asked her to come with him to see his General. Before leaving though, he instructed the other men to interrogate the man in the other cell when he wakes up. Entering an office, she was greeted by a woman in monk's clothing.
"I'm General Eila Deova, commander of this base." She said introducing herself then Fordo whispered something to her and she continued, "Yao Ha Dushi? So Ms. Dushi, you want us to kill the fire dragon."
"Yes! Please help us. The fire dragon came two months ago to my village and has killed many of my people."
"Alright, we'll help you."
Yao's ears perked up. She was completely surprised. She had thought there would be more resistance to her demand making it necessary to carry out her clan's wish to sell herself to them for their help if needed but they had just readily accepted it.
Not wanting to push her luck in asking if there was a price for their help, she stammered, "T—Thank you!"
"You're welcome but tell me, where is the fire dragon?"
"I—It has made its nest on Mount Tube, the highest point of the Tuba Mountain range in the Schwarz Forest."
Eila turned to Fordo and whispered something to him. He proceeded to leave the room and Eila spoke back to Yao, "Thank you, Ms. Dushi. I'll organize a mission right away to eliminate the fire dragon." She signaled for a trooper to enter, "Please get some rest, Ms. Dushi. You'll leave tomorrow with us to be our local guide. This trooper will take you to your quarters."
Yao was absolutely ecstatic as she left the room with the trooper.
'M—My people!' She thought with some tears leaking out, 'You are saved!'
Some time later, Eila was looking over some documents she had been handed until she heard a knock on her door. It was Wrench who came in.
"General, did you just approve a mission to kill the fire dragon?" Wrench asked.
"Yes, I did. Fordo and RT3 are to leave with Ms. Yao Ha Dushi for the Schwarz Forest tomorrow. It seems the fire dragon was in the Kingdom of Elbe after all. All those attacks on our men will soon be avenged. But I am going to order Captain Koll later today to select a pair of pilots to scout the area in force first before RT3 moves in. If Koll's pilots get a chance to kill it, RT3 will still go to confirm its dead and assist in clean up. RT5 should also be rerouted when we do kill it. I'm sure those researchers will want to examine that dragon's corpse." Eila said.
"The Schwarz Forest? The Kingdom of Elbe was it?"
"Yes."
"Are we allowed to cross the border? Isn't it a little dangerous to cross the border of one of the Empire's vassal states when we're about to start negotiations with them?"
"That's right, but we'll be fine."
"Oh? Ah, I see. It's because of that old man isn't it." Wrench said, remembering an old man missing an arm and a leg who was brought in by a group of nuns begging them to use their medical technology to heal him.
"Yeah, in exchange for the cybernetic replacements for his missing limbs, Lord Duran gave us his consent to cross into his lands. Kind of ironic that one of the enemies we fought when we first got here is now an ally for that region." Eila gave a small laugh and continued, "Was that all you wanted to ask, Wrench?"
"Actually, this just came in from a courier of the Princess." He gave a rolled up piece of parchment to her.
Unraveling it and quickly going over it, she spoke back to Wrench, "Looks like the meeting with their Senators is on. It'll be in a few weeks. I'll give the Senate a call and ask how we'll proceed."
"Yes, General."
"Let's do our best to make sure both these missions succeed."
Over the skies of the Special Region, a V-Wing and an ARC-170 were dancing across the sky. Captain Koll in his V-Wing was acting like a droid tri-fighter for dogfighting practice to the new pilot of the ARC-170. The condition to finish the exercise was for either of them to get a solid sensor lock on the other.
"You'll have to try harder than that, Shiny!" Koll radioed as he banked his craft to avoid a sensor lock.
"Damn it! Come on!" The new pilot yelled as he tried to follow Koll's maneuver.
The new pilot's co-pilot though would voice his concern, "Woah, take it easy, Maverick. Trying to match the Captain move for move isn't going to work. We can't match a V-Wing in this tub."
"I know! I know, Nickel!"
The split second of arguing with his co-pilot though costed Maverick since he immediately lost sight of Koll.
"Damn it, where is he?! Nickel? Sparrow?" Maverick called out to his fellow pilots as he and Nickel strained their necks looking all around themselves. His back gunner, Sparrow would tell him.
"He's on our six!"
"Damn he's fast! That's got to be cheating!" Maverick said.
"Fair fights are for suckers, kid!" Koll called back on the comms as he began to line up the 170 for a lock.
Sparrow would try to get the back guns pointed at him but Koll was moving all over the place for Sparrow to get a good shot. Koll was even maneuvering to the blind spots of the back guns. "It's no good! I can't get him!" He said. Maverick's sharp maneuvers were also making it hard for Sparrow to aim properly.
Maverick's mind raced as he considered various ideas to get behind Koll again. One of the ideas he thought of clicked for him and he would advise Nickel and Sparrow about it.
"I'm gonna hit the breaks on him!"
"You serious?" Nickel said, "We could end up hitting each other!"
"If it works though, the Cap flies by and we get a second chance!"
Hearing no further objections from his fellow pilots, Maverick proceeded to arc the nose of his craft up sharply, quickly losing speed. As he had hoped, Koll flew right by.
"Cheeky bastard!" Koll yelled on the comms.
"Fair fights are for suckers, Captain!" Maverick yelled back as he dipped the nose back down and was once again chasing Koll. This time around, it didn't take long for him to lock on to Koll's V-Wing. A continuous ping sounded in Maverick's 170 and a continuous warning sounded in Koll's V-Wing which signaled Maverick's victory for the exercise.
"Oh yeah! Koll's dead!" Maverick shouted in excitement but quickly expected to get chewed out by Koll for his trick. To his surprise though, Koll was laughing instead.
"Haha! Cheeky, kid! Real cheeky! A few more weeks of practice and those droid fighters won't stand a chance! Well, let's head back to base."
Before they could prepare to turn back, Koll received a transmission from Eila.
"General." He responded.
"Captain. Since you and your wingman are already in the air, are you able to conduct a recon mission right now?"
Koll looked over his fuel supply and asked Maverick if his fuel was still good too. Receiving an okay from Maverick, Koll responded to Eila's request. "We can take on a recon mission, General. What's the destination?"
"Mount Tube in the Schwarz Forest in the Kingdom of Elbe. We've gotten word from one of the locals that the fire dragon has settled there. Your orders are to verify that it is there and if you get a chance, try to take it out. RT3 will confirm the kill and help in clean up if you do shoot it down."
"Yes, General." Cutting the transmission, Koll called to Maverick, "Looks like you're getting it good today, kid! You not only won against me but you might just get the chance to take down a flying tank!"
"Yes, sir!" Maverick answered and both craft turned to the direction of the Kingdom of Elbe.
After about an hour and a half of flight, the duo were now flying over the Schwarz Forest.
"Okay, eyes up." Koll called, "When we see the dragon, we'll attack together."
"Yes, sir." Maverick responded.
Doing a flyby over Mount Tube and looking intently for a flying red reptile, both pilots were disappointed not to see anything after having screened the area for the next four hours.
"Do you think the intel was wrong, sir?" Maverick questioned.
"Don't know. The intel came from a local so it should be solid. Maybe it moved on." Koll answered.
"Maybe, Captain. The locals don't exactly have quick transport or sophisticated communication lines. Intel from them could be useless within a few hours."
Turning his V-Wing back towards the direction of Alnus and Maverick following suit, Koll was just about to send a transmission back to base that they haven't found the fire dragon and declaring the mission over until he saw movement on his low left. Squinting a bit, he realized that the red speck that caught his eye was indeed the fire dragon flying in the opposite direction from them.
He called to Maverick, "We just got lucky! Tally, one bandit, 9 o'clock low."
"Yep, I see it, Captain. Lock S-foils into attack position." Maverick called to Nickel.
"It doesn't know we're here. Commence attack."
Maverick confirmed and both craft moved into a diving attack position. Unfortunately for them, Maverick's 170 hadn't been loaded with proton torpedoes since he and Koll were expecting to return to base after their exercise and Koll's V-Wing isn't able to equip a launcher. Fortunately for them, Koll's V-Wing had its rapid-fire laser cannons and Maverick's 170 had medium laser cannons that are rated to punch through capital ship armor, which should be enough for the beast. Approaching for an attack run, both pilots expected to kill the fire dragon in a single pass.
Unfortunately for them again, the dragon wasn't a fool. Despite its vision being impaired on its left side, its hearing was still sharp. Hearing the growing whine of ion engines approaching from behind it, the dragon stopped mid-air and quickly turned its front to its attackers. The sudden stop caused both Koll and Maverick to overshoot. Seeing them clearly with its undamaged eye, the dragon began spewing fire at the pilots who began ascending, aborting the run.
While Koll quickly sped away, Maverick wasn't as fast. "Oh, shit!" Sparrow yelled as streams of fire began filling his view.
"Sparrow, are you alright?!" Maverick yelled back.
"I'm—I'm good." Sparrow said and tried to move and fire the back guns, but wasn't getting any input, "Back guns are down. I think that blasted lizard melted the barrels."
"Another pass." Koll called and both starfighters turned around and dived again.
While the dragon wasn't as fast as them in its attempts to try and catch them, Koll was noticing that it was certainly more maneuverable than them as any time they were about to get a good shot on it, the dragon would move wildly to throw off their aim. It was even throwing off his aim even though he was in a starfighter that was easily on par with the nimble droid tri-fighters. A few more passes were attempted with similar results. Getting tired of playing with it, Maverick pulled away.
"Kid! Maintain formation!" Koll called.
"Sir, we should attack from multiple directions. That beast can't deal with both of us coming at it from different locations especially with its screwed up vision!"
Consenting to Maverick's idea, Koll turned his craft around again and moved from a different position than from where Maverick would make his attack run. With its impaired vision, the dragon couldn't see Koll from its position but it could see Maverick. Maverick let loose with a barrage of laser fire but the dragon swiftly avoided it. When he passed by, the dragon shot some fire breath which scored a hit and damaged the left engine.
"Engine one, flame out!" Nickel yelled to Maverick. Unable to ascend rapidly and the starfighter's speed decreasing, the dragon took it as an opportunity to start chasing the 170. Sparrow would be treated to the wonderful view of seeing the dragon's rows of teeth slowly getting closer.
"Uhh, Maverick?" He would nervously say as he unwittingly pressed on the trigger for his guns even though they were already disabled.
"Come on, Nickel! Get it started!" Maverick ordered.
"It's no good! Restart failed! Our astromech doesn't know how to diagnose the problem!" Nickel answered as he went over the restart procedure and consulting with the astromech again.
Seeing that the dragon was distracted, Koll swooped in to save his student. The dragon was far too focused on Maverick that it had forgotten Koll was still in the fight.
"Don't worry, I got you kid." Koll said as he got behind the dragon and fired his laser cannons. Unfortunately, the dragon's skin was able to resist the barrage with plenty of fragmented scales flying off. His cannons simply weren't powerful enough to overcome the dragon's naturally heat resistant scales so he decided to adjust his aim and began targeting its wings. The wings proved to be thinner as his shots perforated the wings with holes. The dragon roared in pain and began to hobble as its ability to fly had been compromised. The dragon crashed into the forest below them.
"Oh, yeah! Nice shooting, Captain!" Maverick called.
Turning around for another pass, Koll intended to finish the dragon off since it was now grounded. Regrettably, despite being a large animal, the dragon had disappeared into the forest canopy. Koll clicked his tongue and how stubborn the beast was as he circled the crash site but despite having sensors that could locate it in the forest, he decided to head back to base with his wingman since he wasn't sure if Maverick's 170 was going to be able to make it back.
A tense three hour flight back, Maverick was able to land his 170 without further incident. Some of the maintenance engineers would yell at him for being reckless as the barrels of the back guns and the underside and cowling of the left engine had melted. The engineers fumed as while the back guns would be easy to replace, the state of the left engine meant that it would have to be completely removed and replaced with a new engine, which meant hours of work having to make sure it was in tune with the rest of the starfighter. The damage was also severe enough that it was better to scrap the damaged engine than repair it. There would be some surprised engineers though that the fire dragon's breath had managed to melt the engine casing and the underside of the internal structure. It surprised them that the fire dragon's breath was so hot since the ARC-170 and generally all of the Republic's starfighters, should be able to withstand intense heat, otherwise they would never be able to enter the atmosphere of a planet.
Despite the anger from some of the maintenance crew, Maverick could at least brag that he successful distracted the beast, which gave Koll a chance to wound it to the point that it was unlikely to be flying again in the near future. When word reached the rest of the base, there were some optimistic boasts flying around that the fire dragon should be easy to deal with now since it could no longer fly away from a fight if it was cornered. Still, when word reached Fordo, he remained unconvinced that it would be an easy detail as he requisitioned for more ordinance to finish the job for the next day.
When Koll dropped off both his and Maverick's report about the recon mission, Eila was disturbed that the fire dragon continued to persist. An ARC-170 and a V-Wing, even without torpedoes should have been enough. She had secretly hoped that RT3s mission would have just been for cleanup but she was now doubting if they could even succeed in killing it. What Senator Dod said about her during the Senate session was also biting at her. Calling Fordo to her office, she changed his orders. He and RT3 would stay at base and help in preparing various measures before meeting with the Empire's Senators. She intended to kill the fire dragon alone.
"General, I must protest." Fordo said, "Going after the fire dragon alone is far too reckless."
She sighed, "I know, but I won't risk your lives for this. You've already had some difficulty fighting it and the starfighters we sent only crippled it. Not to mention that we've also lost thirteen troopers to it!"
"I understand but we have the ordinance, General. We're better equipped than the last time we faced it and better equipped now than any other recon team before. Besides, better us clones than a J—"
"Enough!" She interrupted, "You're not expendable! Not me. And not to any Jedi who believes in you and your brothers."
While Fordo appreciated her sentiment, it was still too dangerous, "I'm sorry General, but I still must protest."
"I understand, but I'm not changing your orders back."
He sighed, "Then I must inform you General that my only choice is to lodge a formal complaint to the Jedi Order and to the Military Oversight Committee."
She thought about what that would mean for her but chose not to care about the consequences.
"Do what you need to do." She said, "Dismissed."
Fordo saluted but before he could leave, Eila asked him to wait a moment and said, "Don't tell, Wrench."
He silently left the office.
Packing up one of the last remaining modified speeders that hadn't been scrapped yet with the thermal detonators and rocket launchers Fordo asked for in the early morning, Eila was almost ready to leave. She left enough space in the speeder for Yao to be with her since she didn't know the locals. To explain her absence, she lied to Wrench the night before that she was going to Italica to talk to Myui and her father, about economics and lied that Fordo's mission had been put on hold for further intelligence gathering. Picking up another pack of thermal detonators and directing Yao to pick up another pair of rocket launchers, she would be startled when someone started talking to her.
"Oh my! Oh my! Aren't you being naughty, Eila?"
Turning around, she saw Rory, Lelei, and Tuka standing before her.
"Wha—What are you three doing here?" Realizing their only reason for being up this early, she asked, "Did Fordo tell you?"
Rory made no attempt to disguise it, "Oh yes! The good Captain told us what you were going to do."
Lelei spoke up next, "You will need assistance to deal with the fire dragon. If you refuse to call on your men, at least call upon us."
"Yes! And you can't order us not to come with you because we're not in your military!" Tuka said.
"Well, I can always order my men to make you stay." Eila countered.
"Oh, but if you were to do that then we'll have tell the Commander what you're up to." Rory casually stated.
Not seeing a way out, Eila reluctantly agreed for them to join, "Fine. But, if you're coming with me, we'll need a bigger ride."
Author's Note: Just a little note that I will obviously not fully disclose how this story will continue or end. I also have to say that, while I'm grateful for all the suggestions you've posted for how my story should go on, you should all probably reconsider to avoid disappoint if what you want to happen, doesn't come to pass. I'm sorry but I just wanted to say this as a little cautionary note on expectations.
Now, with Krell, I've actually hinted in an earlier chapter that Wrench did not like his previous General at all and Crom said it out loud when he and Eila first meet and was the basis for Crom's suspicions in the first place when he would report to Palpatine.