I apologize, my beta was extremely busy. Here's the next post, hope y'all enjoy.
Disclaimer: See first post. Side note, the game portion of the story is about to begin. I claim no ownership over the dialog that comes from the game, even if I changed it to fit the story. I only claim the dialog I came up with.
"Ensign Ulgo," the male green-skinned Twi'lek Jedi on board said, stopping the soldier as he was on his way to the mess hall.
Trask Ulgo swore under his breath. He had done nothing-that he knew of. Why were the Jedi speaking to him? They never spoke to the lower ranked soldiers. Well, he amended silently. These four don't. There are other Jedi who do actually try to get along with the crew, but they are few and far between.
He briefly wondered just why the Jedi seemed to shun friendship as the brown-haired, broad shouldered Jedi stopped in front of him.
"Yes, Sir?" Trask asked, trying hard not to let his confusion show.
"Bastila requests that you follow me," the male said, his baritone voice nearly a whisper. "She needs to ask you for a favor."
Trask frowned, wondering just what was up. He had never heard of Bastila Shan asking anyone for help. The young Jedi, upon whose slim shoulders rested the fate of the galaxy, had never, to his knowledge, ever shown that she needed anyone's help. He found himself nodding and following the male to the suites that the Jedi had taken. The male opened the last door on the right and gestured for Trask to precede him. Trask mutely stepped across the threshold and felt a slight weight settle onto his shoulders, though he was unsure if it was because the Jedi were doing something or because of his nervousness and uncertainty over the whole thing.
Bastila was sitting by a gray table, looking for all the galaxy like the regal being that some soldiers claimed she was. Trask had the oddest feeling of a being the peasant sent to see the princess in some old holovid he had once seen. Somehow, he knew that this meeting would not go like it did in the vids.
"Ensign Trask Ulgo," he said, happy that his voice held none of the nervousness he felt. "Reporting as ordered."
"Ensign, thank you for coming so promptly," Bastila said. "Won't you please sit?" she added, gesturing to the empty chair across the table from her.
"I'd prefer to stand, ma'am," he said. Stand as far from you as I can, he added silently. Inwardly he grimaced, praying she had not heard that. He had heard from some friends of his that Jedi could read a being's thoughts. He glanced at Bastila but the woman showed no sign that she knew what he was thinking.
"As you wish," Bastila said, her tone reminding Trask of an old teacher he had in school when he was a kid. Trask had the oddest feeling of failing an important test but could not for the life of him figure out when he took it. "I need you to do something for the galaxy," Bastila continued.
Trask watched her warily. He respected the Jedi but after Revan and Malak had turned, his trust in them had taken a serious blow. Once he would say that the Jedi were the good guys, now he was not so sure. Now he put nothing past them that included manipulating someone for their own means.
"The woman that bunks with you and Ensign Dilon Chaviv," Bastila said and Trask noticed a slightly disdainful look fleetingly cross her face before the Jedi schooled her features. Features, Trask noted, that would be considered desirable if not for the arrogance in her eyes. "She is important, for what I cannot say. If there is an attack-"
"You think there will be an attack?" he asked, surprised.
"If there is an attack," Bastila continued her tone so harsh that Trask involuntarily winced, "she needs to be protected. If for some reason the Jedi are not able to, I need you to make sure she gets off the ship."
"Why me?" Trask asked.
"Excuse me?" Bastila responded, sounding a little surprised. Trask wondered if anyone had dared to question her before.
"Why are you asking me? Dilon's closer to her."
"Dilon is too close to her. She needs to be looked after by someone who is not infatuated with her."
"Why is she so important?" Trask asked, frowning. He had met the woman and could not see how she could change the galaxy at all.
"That is none of your concern, Ensign," Bastila replied firmly. "Your only concern is to make sure she survives if we are attacked."
"Is this an order?" Trask asked, his lack of trust for the Jedi causing his tone to harden.
"Yes, Ensign, it is an order and it precedes any others."
"Yes, ma'am," Trask replied. "If there is nothing else I need to get back. I have only a short time for lunch." And you've already taken half of it.
Bastila waved her hand and Trask knew he was being dismissed. It seemed now that she had ordered him, her reason for speaking to him was gone and she was able to go back to being the close-mouthed, proper Jedi she was before. Trask nodded, spun on his heel and hurried out of the room, grateful that the weight he had felt walking in was now gone.
He hurried back to the mess hall, hoping that he would at least get something before he had to report back. He was doubtful that the Jedi would be willing to explain to his superior why he had not been able to eat in the allotted time.
Trask ran down the corridor to his quarters. Twenty standard minutes ago a Sith battle fleet had ambushed the Endar Spire as it was coming into the Taris system. The cruiser was hit from all sides and the hull had been breached in numerous spots. He had seen the four Jedi run for the opposite end of the ship, getting Bastila to an escape pod. One had told him to go perform his duty. Now, Trask was hurrying to do just that.
Not paying attention to the others around him, he barreled into someone. Stepping back he found himself staring at Dilon.
"Dilon!" he cried, startled. "Look, come on. I've got to get Kaori to the escape pods."
The man needed no further encouragement. Together they raced towards the barracks. Just at the entrance to the short corridor leading to the room, Trask skidded to a stop as the sound of metal tearing could be heard over the blaring alarms. He turned to Dilon.
"Go!" Dilon shouted over the noise. "The Sith have boarded the Spire. Get Kaori. I'll hold any off that come this way."
Trask nodded, watching as the younger man lifted his blaster rifle. Dilon was a marksman and Trask knew his and Kaori's backs would be covered. He ran down the short corridor and slammed his hand on the opening mechanism for the door.
The klaxons blaring and the ship jerking combined to wake Kaori up from a sound sleep. She blinked her eyes, not sure if everything was a dream or a drill until one particularly hard jerk dumped her off her bunk and made her crack her head on the deck. Groaning, she got slowly to her feet, looking around to find the room empty.
The sound of the door opening caused her to turn around. A man with closely-cropped, white hair in a red and white uniform stood there. Kaori had trouble placing who the man was.
"We're under attack!" he yelled. "A Sith battle fleet has ambushed us."
"Who are you?" Kaori asked, momentarily bewildered.
"I'm Trask Ulgo, I'm your bunkmate on the Endar Spire along with Dilon. I work opposite shifts, that's why you don't see me much. Now, come on, Bastila needs us."
"Bastila?" Kaori asked.
"Bastila's the commanding officer on the Endar Spire, well, she's the Jedi in charge. The Sith want her. It's our job to keep them from getting her. I know you're a scout and not a soldier but you swore an oath to protect her as well as everyone else. It's time to make good on that oath."
"Alright," Kaori ground out against the pain in her skull. The blow to her head on the deck and Trask's yelling were combining to give her a massive headache, and that was making her irritable.
"Get your gear," Trask ordered. "We've got to get to the bridge."
Kaori spun on her heel and opened her footlocker, only then realizing that she was in her underwear. Growling in Trask's direction she pulled on her clothes. Holstering her blaster and sheathing her sword, she made sure to put her jade ring in a secure pocket of her bag. Grabbing the bag, she faced Trask.
"Alright," Trask said spinning on his heel. "I'll open the door. It's locked because we've just gone into lockdown."
Kaori nodded and watched as he fiddled with the panel beside the door. It opened with an air-filled whoosh and Kaori noticed a sole utility droid working on a transformer.
"Okay," Trask said, looking at Kaori. "You better take the lead. I'll cover you."
Kaori nodded and stepped out the door only to hear the commander calling them over their wrist-comlinks. The man was calling for an 'all hands to the bridge.'
"If he says things are bad," Trask commented as they reached the far door. "You had better believe they are. That man's seen more combat than you or I put together."
Kaori glanced at Trask, ignoring his comments – more worried if he could open the locked door in front of them. The white haired man must have figured out what she wanted because he shrugged.
"I don't have the codes to that door," he said, apologetically. "It was open when I came to get you. You'll have to slice the controls and open it."
Kaori sighed and flipped the panel on the side of the red and white door open. It opened after she had fiddled with the innards a bit. Kaori gasped as she watch Dilon get shot by a Sith trooper.
"For the Republic!" Trask yelled.
Kaori paid little attention to him. She drew her sword and charged the Sith that had shot her friend, with more fury than she had thought she possessed.
Soon the skirmish was over and the Sith lay lifeless on the deck. Kaori was bleeding from various cuts on her arm and side and from multiple blaster burns on her shoulders, back, and arms. She did not take note of them or of Trask's injuries as she knelt by Dilon.
"H-hey, P-priya," he whispered.
"Shhh," Kaori whispered. "Save your breath. I'll inject you with some kolto. You'll be fine."
"T-t-too l-late," Dilon whispered before a racking cough cut him off. Kaori noticed that he spit up blood. The ensign slowly placed something in Kaori's hand. "Take t-this. Get the Si-s-sith for me." He stared into her eyes. "I t-th-think we c-could have been gr-eat to-tog-together."
Kaori smiled, despite of the tears streaming down her face. "Yes," she whispered.
"G-go," Dilon said, as firmly as he could. "Kick the S-sith back where they b-b-belong. In a r-ra-rancor pit."
"That'd give the rancor indigestion," Kaori said, weakly.
Dilon smiled and Kaori felt it as he stopped breathing. She laid her head on his chest, her hair becoming bloodied. She felt Trask kneel beside her and place a comforting arm around her shoulders but she did not notice.
"Come on," he whispered after a moment.
Kaori slowly stood, leaning on Trask. She looked at her hand to see Dilon had given her his holoalbum. She stepped away from Trask, and pocketed the device. "Let's go," she said, her voice controlled and firm. "Those Sith will rue the day they killed my friend!"
Trask nodded and they made their way to the bridge, fighting Sith and taking supplies from the lifeless bodies of friend and foe alike along the way.
"That's a Dark Jedi," Trask said when they had opened another door. Before them a bald human man in silver armor and a brown haired human woman in a tan tunic were fighting with lightsabers. Trask laid a hand on Kaori's arm. "We better stay back. We'd just get in the way."
They watched as the pair exchanged parries and strikes until the Dark Jedi fell dead, at the woman's feet. Before Kaori or Trask could react, a bolt from a turbolaser struck near the woman. The already-wounded Jedi fell, never to get back up.
Trask cursed. "We could have used her help."
Before either could do anything else, three troopers ran into the corridor. Unsheathing her sword, Kaori charged.
Soon those three were dead. Kaori knelt next to the woman Jedi. She picked up the lady's lightsaber and a vibration cell for a vibroblade. Placing both in her pack she faced the Jedi. "I'll return you saber to the Jedi," she vowed. "And I'll tell them you went out doing your duty."
Trash urged her to continue on and Kaori nodded.
They continued on to the bridge and when they had dispatched the troops there Trask commented that Bastila must have already made it to the escape pods. Checking bodies for supplies, Kaori nodded. They continued onto the starboard section of the ship. Opening the door to a conference room, Trask ran to the far door.
"There's something behind here," he said.
The door opened to reveal a tall bald man in black armor. An odd thought about why the Sith all seemed to like having shaved heads passed through Kaori's mind a second before Trask said that he would hold the man off long enough for her to get to the escape pod.
"Tra-" was all Kaori got out before the man ran through the door and locked it shut behind him. She hung her head. "I'll avenge you," she whispered before hurrying through the starboard section door.
A beep from her wrist made her look down. Carth was speaking. "There's a Sith patrol down the hall. Use your stealth belt and sneak past him."
Kaori glance around the bend in the corridor and saw the lone Sith trooper. She growled, sounding a lot like the razorcat she had run across on Corellia, and charged him. "This is for Dilon," she snarled as she sliced his chest. She spun away from his answering parry. As she completed the spin she sliced his neck. "And that's for Trask," she whispered, sadly, all the fight draining out of her.
She checked the body for anything useful and then hurried down the corridor. She opened a door and found two Sith troopers. With a scowl on her face, she charged the nearest one.
Decorated war hero, pilot almost his whole life, brilliant tactician, yet all that that could not help Carth Onasi as he watched the woman on the Spire's computers. He had warned her about the patrol and watched as the woman, disregarding his advice to sneak past the Sith, attacked instead. He shook his head wondering just what was going through her mind. He had warned her that she needed to get to the escape pod room soon or he would have to leave her. He prayed to whatever gods would hear that he would not have to do that. He had never left a living comrade behind before and did not want to start now. He would be out there helping her fight, if not for the fact that the door would only open from the outside now.
"What is she doing?" he asked himself. "Trying to get herself killed?"
Soon she was two rooms from him. He pressed the activation on his comlink. "There are a bunch of Sith on the other side of that door. You need to find a way to thin their numbers. You could repair that damaged droid or use computer spikes to slice into the terminal and blow the transformer in the room."
He watched as she opened the panel on the back of the droid and fiddled with its systems. The white droid sprung to life, testimony to the woman's repair skill. Carth watched as both the woman and the droid entered the room and made short work of the five Sith.
He turned just as the door to the room he was in opened, and smiled at her as she hurried through. He recognized her as the woman the Jedi had requested come aboard. He found it odd that she had never been allowed into one meeting amongst the Jedi and command crew of the ship.
"You made it!" he exclaimed. "Bastila's pod is already away. There's only one left. Let's get out of here."
"Just how do I know I can trust you?" the woman asked.
"I'm a soldier with the Republic fleet, like you. Come on, there's no reason to get shot by the Sith. If you have any questions ask them later."
The woman nodded. Carth stepped over to the control panel for the escape pod. Out of the corner of his eye he watched Kaori press the lockdown button on the door.
"What was that all about?" he asked, confused. He hit the open button on the panel. The door to the pod began to iris open. Kaori surprised Carth by pushing him towards the opening. "What?" he asked, flustered.
"No time," she answered, hurriedly. "He's coming."
"Who's coming?"
"Get in. I'll tell you later."
The tone of her voice convinced Carth that something was really wrong. He hurriedly got in, watching as she wedged herself in and slammed the door shut seconds before it rocketed off the ship.