Last On: Rey and Ben make it out of the trap and meet those who set it. Poe was captured by Hux. Snap and Finn find a way into the kitchen and are at a stand-off against Boche's men. Klive prepares to destroy a suppression device, even though he knows he won't survive the encounter.
Chapter 39 – The Uugteen Attack!
Klive is so focused he doesn't hear the sound of the Uugteen war howl as it fills the space. The stormtroopers on guard, however, do hear it. It fills them with terror, and makes them shoot wildly, with little aim at whatever threat they can perceive.
In the room there are several of what appear to be old droids. The trooper's commander had assumed they were placed there for the purpose of decoration. He assumed wrong. As soon as the howl starts they begin to move. They ignore Klive and go straight for the troopers.
Klive still manages to shoot and disable the jammer device, then he lookes at himself, shocked to not find a blaster wound. He is still hearing shots being fired.
The troopers find themselves under attack by creatures wearing old droid armor. What skin they have exposed is painted to seamlessly blend in with the armor. If the First Order had spent more time researching the locals, they would know these are Uugteen. When the Uugteen finally kill their troopers, each lifts his head and their yowls join the chorus. Then Klive hears it and looks up at them. He backs away in fear, but the Uugteen ignore him and run out of the room.
Poe is kneeling before Hux when they hear the Yowling begin.
"What's that?" Hux questions, but his men shake their heads. They don't have an answer. "Shoot him." Hux gives the order, disinterested.
One of the troopers pulls out his blaster and steps back. Lining up for the perfect shot.
Poe closes his eyes.
The droid in the corner of the room, the one Hux called a tacky decoration, stands up and throws itself in the way of the shot.
Everyone in the room is shocked by the sight of the humanoid creature with droid parts strapped to his arms and legs. The Uugteen yowls a soft hum, as his wounds bleed out on the floor.
Meanwhile the yowling increases in volume until a hoard of Uugteen arrive. They throw themselves on the troopers, and soon the noise is mixed with men yelping and screaming their last breaths.
Poe was released by the troopers when this all began. He walks around in a daze, shocked by what he sees. Then a redheaded lump crawling away from the scene catches his eye. Poe grabs the blaster from a fallen trooper and runs after him.
"Surrender." Poe aims the blaster at Hux's head.
Hux looks back at Poe with real fear in his eyes. Poe is not sure the man ever showed that much fear in his life. Then Poe hears the chime from his wrist. It's a notification he has a comm coming trough. Thankfully Finn's armor designs put a second comm device in the wrist of the armor, as Poe's helmet is now lost somewhere under several dead troopers.
"Poe, Anybody, come in." Finn comms desperately, looking for any answer. In the kitchen they hear sounds of violence and fear the worst.
"Sounds like backup's finally arrived." Commander Boche smiles.
The hostages clutch each other, shaking with fear.
"I don't think that's the sound of Hux's men." One Boche's own men says.
"No, that yowl I'll remember the rest of my life." One of the hostages, an older Abednedo man who's missing an arm from an old injury, speaks up. "That's the sound of death, if you wander into the wrong cave on Akiva. The Uugteen."
"Primitives are no match for the mighty First Order," Boche says.
Finn continues calling to anyone outside on his comm.
"Finn!" the delighted voice of Poe startles Finn when he hears it. "Oh Yeah! What's your Status?"
"We're in the kitchen, at a standoff with Boche's men. What's your status?" Finn asks.
"I'll let you answer that, Hugs." Poe must be passing his comm device over, because the next voice that comes out isn't his.
"This is Supreme General Hux. By command code One, Two, Five, Point Three, Nine, Nine, E, all units are commanded to stand down. I repeat all units are commanded to stand down." Hux then continues in a very week voice "We surrender."
"No, no, no!" Boche shouts as his men begin to set down their arms and raise their hands in surrender. Boche still has his blaster aimed at one of the hostages, an Ithorian female, who screames and shakes with fear as Boche grabs her and holds his blaster closer to her back.
The others are forced to hold their shots as Boche backs up with the hostage and kicks the kitchen door open with his foot. He drops her in the last moment and turns running outside for the bushes. He never makes it to the bushes, as two figures suddenly jump out and pounce on him. The others watch from inside the kitchen as his screams slowly fade from his body.
Snap aims his weapon at the Uugteen, but when they are finished with Boche, they merely look up at the crowd of onlookers and prance away. "I never..." Snap breaths a sigh of relief.
Rey and Ben were led by the Uugteen elder through another set of tunnels to the surface in the city of Myrra. They climbed a last set of stairs and went through a gate, entering the main city square of Akiva. They looked around in shock. What was once a lively market had been reduced to overthrown baskets and tattered curtains.
Rey saw movement in one of the nearby windows. She and Ben went there and opened the door to find about ten mixed race Akivans huddled under a table. They looked up in fear, then when they saw Ben, they fell on their faces in a bow.
"What happened here?" Rey asked.
One of them, a human female, answered, "Stormtroopers arrived and ordered everyone inside. They began searching for you, Supreme Leader, and questioning everyone. When they couldn't find what they were looking for they destroyed our stalls in the market. They moved on through the city. Then we could here the yowling. The yowling we teach our children to fear. A hoard of Uugteen passed through this block on their way uptown. No one has left their homes since. Are we safe, Supreme Leader?"
Ben didn't know how to answer her. He pulled aside to whisper to Rey when the Uugteen elder came up behind them to the doorway. Those inside screamed and clutched each other out of fear. "It's ok," Ben said. "He's with us." 'I think,' Ben knew it would be truer to add the last bit on, but he didn't think it would help.
"Stay here. We're gonna go on and check where our armies are. When you hear the city bells, know it's safe to come out," Rey sounded a lot more confident, which marveled Ben.
As Ben and Rey walked uptown they found they had to walk through pools of blood, and over bodies, mostly of dead stormtroopers.
Eventually one of the doors opened, and a red faced man in an apron waved them to come over. "We have prisoners, sir," he said, giving a bow as Rey and Ben approached.
"What happened?" Rey asked as and Ben came up to stand near the doorway.
"In here," he led them inside his workshop. "When the stormtroopers were here, one of them was asking about your location. He put his hands on my wife, while his men were trashing my workshop. I couldn't take it anymore. I picked up the blade on my workbench, and I pointed it at him. There were five guys, plus more outside the shop. I knew I didn't stand a chance. But before I could regret the decision, a yowling pack of Uugteen came running up the street. They were killing trooper after trooper. The one I had my knife to, he just raised his hands and surrendered. Several Uugteen came in and killed the two troopers who didn't have their hands raised, but they let everyone else go."
"Impressive," Ben said.
"I got'em tied up in the back room. They say their orders come from General Hux. That's all they've been able to tell me."
Ben nodded. "Keep them here. When I have use for them I'll send someone. Good work."
Farther on, Ben and Rey entered another marketplace. This square looked a lot more alive. In the middle there were several troopers, holding other troopers prisoner. There were also Akivans walking around. One of them walked up to a trooper, made to kneel by another trooper, and spat at him. The trooper holding him prisoner merely waved the Akivan on. When they saw Ben and Rey walking up, the Akivans began to cheer. Several came out with flags in their hands and waved them at Ben, Rey, and the Uugteen elder who followed them through town.
"Supreme Leader Kylo Ren, Sir." one of the troopers knelt at Ben's feet.
"Rise," said Ben. "Status."
"Our units were deployed to fight off the intruders. Immediately we were at a loss. No one expected such a large army to be sent down. Then when those creatures came through, Hux's men started surrendering to us in droves. It's amazing, Sir, the creatures hadn't harmed any of my men, the Akivans, or any of those who surrendered. Just those still fighting.
"Yes, you'll want to send someone to a shop back that way. The shopkeeper has a few more prisoners."
"You've not heard the best bit, Sir. Hux has surrendered. He's with one of your men in the Palace." This made Ben smile.
Hello, folks. I know I am spinning the Uugteen in a different direction than they were used before. I hope you still find it cool, though.
Check out my other project on here. Click my profile name, it's under there...
I anticipate there will be one more chapter to this, but then that could change once I start to write it. I'm really bad at keeping things short.
