Roy grabbed another handful of snow off the mountainside, setting it in his mouth before picking his binoculars back up. He was perched on a ridge on an adjacent mountain to were the Imperial outpost the farm boy had mentioned. The outpost in question was built into the next mountain over, the only visible signs of the base being a massive set of dual doors and a series of antennas on top of the peak.
"That's a lot of commo crap for just an outpost." Madelyn was lying in the snow beside him, her own set of binos in hand.
"Yeah, told you there was an outpost out here." On his other side was the farm boy who led them here, also prone but he had his hunting rifle shouldered, his eye to the scope.
"Hate to break it to you guys, but that's not an outpost. Your staring at a listening and space observation post." Roy scanned across the post as he spoke, spotting several sensor nodes and hideaway weapons positions. If he hadn't been trained as he had, he wouldn't have spotted any of the extra defenses.
I'm not seeing any ground based sensors, not even a perimeter. Judging by the three foot patrols I see, they may think there is no threat of rebel ground. Makes sense, this system is a backwater with no tactical relevance. No point to protect too heavily. That listening post on the other hand… if they cracked our encryption it would explain how this sector's fleet has been having so much trouble maneuvering out here.
"Alright, will the plan still work though?" Madelyn didn't look up from her binos to speak. She was still dressed in her typical civilian gear, though she had added an extra layer to combat the cold air.
"It should. It only has four defense guns by the looks, and all of it's sensors are for space detection. So we should be able to nail it from the skies." Roy shimmied back down the ridge a short way before stowing his binoculars in his vest. He had taken the liberty to throw his combat vest and helmet on, also securing his rifle from the ship before it departed back to base. So while he was still wearing his now damaged leather jacket and ratty cargo pants, he had a fabric pouch covered vest on over it with hard dura steel plates inside it. In his chest pouches were spare power packs for his rifle and grenades, an assault pack on his shoulders carrying det charges.
So we're still hiking up to the antennas and blowing em sky high, right?"
"Yeah. Tosh, you're staying here, keep an eye on us with that scope. Do not fire unless I tell you to." Roy pulled his rifle off his side where it had been slung while he was prone.
"Hey, I can sneak up there with yall!"
"Don't care. I want you back here. Unless you can't make a click shot with that rifle of yours?" Roy glared at the younger man, not particularly happy with having to work with the kid. That had been entirely Captain Holden's idea.
Even Kyra is better than him. At least she has some basic training.
"I can do that sort of shot on a running Nexu in my sleep!"
Roy rolled his eyes at the young hotshot wannabe, doing a visual once over of his gear, making sure it was all still accounted for and secured properly. "Then quit bitching and get comfortable." As soon as he finished, he was keying the microphone for his comlink. They were transmitting on a super low wave transmission to a short range receiver he set up higher on the hill. That receiver was broadcasting a directional signal away from them and the outpost to prevent their comms from being detected. "Holden, mission is a go. We're moving in time now. ETA to comm blackout, thirty mics."
Once he sent that transmission, he waved Madelyn after him as they began picking their way further down the hill, where a cleft in the ridge would allow them to cross it without silhouetting themselves. He wasn't expecting a response on the comms, as that would have meant transmitting a signal toward the post. They moved slowly and deliberately, Roy using the scanning equipment built into his commando helmet visor display to watch for any ground detection systems. Oddly, he found none, something that bothered him.
This is against normal protocol. Foot patrols are not enough for proper security. Either these troops are sloppy or I've missed something. He tightened his grip on his weapon, pushing further up the mountain. Despite the fact that the snow and terrain made it far more difficult to move over than the several foot paths snaking up the mountain. The reason for avoiding them being they were likely formed by imperial patrols. Ergo, it was better to avoid said trails as it meant a higher likely hood of avoiding the enemy.
The climb ended up totally uneventful though, Roy's patience and deliberate movements the only reasons that was so. He had to bring them to a stop near the peak though, as there was a pair of stormtroopers watching the area. Their high gloss armor, despite being the same white as the snow, was easy to spot.
"Tosh, can you see the two stormtroopers at the base of the antenna towers?" Roy whispered as quietly as he could manage, keeping his weapon generally aimed toward them and hoping the post didn't pick up his transmissions. Given the dishes were models used for monitoring deep space traffic, his low-band signals should be completely undetectable to them. That's what he hoped at least.
"Yeah, easy shot too."
"Alright, wai-" Roy didn't get to finish as a blaster bolt ripped overhead, slamming into the helmet of one of the two stormtroopers and piercing clean through.
FUCK!!! Roy immediately sighted in on the other stormtrooper, squeezing off a trio of rushed shots at the trooper's chest. The first two pounded into the trooper, punching holes in his armor before the man collapsed. The third zipped off over the peak, likely dissipating long before it hit anything.
"Damn it Tosh! I was telling you to wait for my signal! You just blew our fucking cover you idiot!" he wasn't quite shouting into his headset, not wanting to give any more clues to his location. As he was finishing, he felt his pack get tugged on, just a moment before Madelyn was rushing up the hill with several det charges in hand.
"Damn it Stodel, not you two!" he muttered that to himself, leaping from his prone position to shift to a rock outcropping, using it to pull security down the mountain. As of yet, there was no sign of movement, but there was no way the empire hadn't noticed those shots at the very least.
"What? I made the shot didn't I? don't get yer panties in a knot!"
"That's not the point!" Roy angrily tossed that back through the comm, not taking his eyes off the snow covered mountainside. A moment later, Stodel was running by him, dropping into the snow just beyond the rocks he was using for cover.
The hell is she doing!?
"You might want to get behind something!" she cheerily yelled that to him, waving her hand at him. For a moment, he was confused, too focused on the terrain and the stupid kid. Then he noticed what she was holding in the hand she was waving at him.
Fuuuuuck… he nearly said that aloud, just as she depressed the button atop the detonator. He did his best to flatten himself to the ground, covering his weapon with his body. A split moment later, a rapid series of violent booms ripped over him, blasting snow and debris past him. Even with the noise canceling systems in his helmet, the blasts deafened him, dozens of faint plunks reaching him as bits of debris continued to rain down on the snow around him.
Does anyone here ever wait for fucking orders! He furiously shoved himself to his feet, letting gravity do the work as he began running down the mountain. He didn't even have to say a word to Stodel for her to do the same.
"Captain, airwaves are clear, start your approach run, Tosh, you better not screw up lazing that bunker door!" he shouted that in his comlink as he ran. Almost on cue with him finishing his statement, red bolts started to slap into the snow around him. Each shot was causing the snow to be vaporized into steam. In response, he leapt into a narrow gully formed into the mountainside, clear of the enemy fire. Stodel was only a step behind him.
"Roger that Roy, ETA, two mics, hang tight." The captain's voice spilled through his helmet as blaster fire continued to slap the ground around the gully, slowly intensifying.
"Ya know dude, ya should prolly be more concerned with getting the heck off that mountain." As Tosh's voice came over the radio, three lances ripped away from the opposing peak in rapid succession. Given the sudden drop in enemy fire, he could only imagine all three as striking targets.
"Working on it!" he countered back over the radio with that, peaking out of the gully to spit a flurry of blasts at the sources of enemy fire. He didn't expose himself long enough to notice individuals though.
"Well, work faster, they opened the blast doors and they got a walker striding out."
"Cap, you hear that!? They got an AT-ST! I'd rather not get blasted to smithereens today!" Roy's voice ripped through Holden's helmet, the pilot ducking and weaving his X-wing through the mountain tops, keeping the throttle maxed.
"Working on it, ETA, thirty! Just get that tunnel lazed!" he spoke as he ripped around the last mountain between him and the objective. There was still several kilometers before he would be in range, but the flight path he had chosen lined him up on the entrance doors for the base. With any luck, this put him on a straight shot into the facility. "Chirps! Get the torps locked on for the laze target, I'm going to take out that AT-ST, you better have it ready for me to switch and dump torps!"
His R2 unit immediately chirped back at him, as he centered his cannon crosshairs on the walker, letting the targeting computer acquire a firing solution and adjust the convergence point on the four laser cannons for the walker. Just a moment later, he heard a solid lock tone, his crosshair switching from green to red to visually confirm the lock. He jammed the trigger on the control stick in, several rapid high pitched blasts ripping through his fighter as his scarlet bolts lanced over the landscape. The bolts were only airborne for the barest trace of a moment as the unlinked stream of shots lanced into the distant shape of the walker. It detonated in a brilliant fireball, Holden immediate flicking a switch on his control panel to change to the torpedoes. With a quick thumbing of a button on the flight stick, he linked his twin torpedo tubes to fire together, the lock tone filling his cockpit once more. The symbol on his helmet HUD though had shifted to a solid red square, just left of his direction of flight. He tapped the left rudder before squeezing the trigger once more, a whompf marking the weapons deploying. He didn't wait for the results, ramming the control stick back as the mangled remains of the antenna's at the peak of the mountain became terrifyingly large just before the peak disappeared from his view. By his altimeter, he had missed slamming into the peak by a dozen meters or so, though he honestly felt like it was much closer than that.
He throttled back as he continued his pitch, looping back over the mountain as a boom faintly echoed over his fighter's engine noise. Below him, the entire mountain had cracked apart, dust blasting dozens of meters into the air as it collapsed into itself, a good hundred meters shorter than it was a moment ago.
"Good hit, I say again, good hit! Post is history!" Roy's voice spilled through his helmet once more, Holden unable to keep a smirk off his face.
"Well that was nice and easy, eh Roy?"
"You weren't running your ass off a mountain about to explode while being shot at by a scout walker!"
"Oh, relax, you were fi-" an alarm cut his voice off, immediately jamming his yoke to the left and smoothly transitioning it to the rear of it's housing. At the same time, he was slamming his throttle forward with his left hand. Despite his rapid maneuver and vector change, his craft shuddered, green light illuminating his cockpit as a blast hit shielding. A glance out his starboard and he could see a pair of imperial tie fighters diving toward the ground. One was vectoring after him, the other firing toward the ground.
"I just had to open my big mouth, didn't I?" he swiftly shifted the yoke to the back right corner of the housing, rolling the craft back level as he continued to pitch, cutting back on the throttle to slow down and tighten his turn. Thankfully, though still faster than an X-Wing, Imperial Tie Fighters had issues maneuvering in atmosphere. So his tight turn easily pulled him clear of his pursuer's fire. The second Tie was currently pitching up and away from the ground, dust plumes marking where it's blasts had struck the mountain side. It was still moving off to his right, but he could see the red lights of its ion engines, putting him in an advantageous position on it. With a pair of button clicks on his control yoke, he shifted his weapons from unlinked fire to dual linked fire, two of the four indicators around his crosshair lighting up to show which two cannons were primed to fire. Particularly his top right and bottom left weapons. With a slight twitch to his control yoke and a gentle backward pull, he had pitched his nose up beyond the Tie, giving the trigger a pair of rapid squeezes and a tap of his rudder. His first blast completely missed, but his second blast scored a direct center mass hit with one of his scarlet bolts. The Tie immediately burst into flames, spiraling out of control and toward the ground.
He didn't watch the doomed fighter though, jamming his throttle to the max again as he rolled and pitched to the left, and just in time as several linked pairs of green bolts ripped by him, the other Tie fighter now pursuing him. After only a moment of turning, he rolled the other way enough to be level relative to the surface again, pitching and decelerating again. The tight pair of turns forced the tie fighter to also roll to try to pitch after him, but the drag on it's solar panel threw it off course, blowing past his near stopped craft. He simply continued his roll for a moment, lining up a space just ahead of the enemy Tie's banking flight path before pitching his craft into an upside down intercept. He switched his weapons back to unlinked fire, squeezing the trigger to fire a flurry of shots, pitching and ruddering to spray them around a little. Two scored direct hits on the banking and juking tie fighter, one harmlessly ripping through the top of it's port solar panel, the other hitting the junction of the same solar panel to its ball cockpit. This tore the solar panel off the fighter, sending it into an uncontrollable spiral for the ground.
Can't let this guy eject and warn his buddies about us… sorry about this… he grimaced as he let his targeting computer get a firing solution this time, quad-linking his lasers before firing. All four converged on the ball cockpit of the fighter, blasting the doomed ship into hundreds of shards of mangled metal.
"Roy, Stodel, Tosh, do any of you copy!?" he bit his lip as he spoke, worried that the one strafing run might have gotten them.
"We're a little rattled down here, but we're good. Just a little dusty!" Stodel's voice shouted back through the comms, prompting a sigh of relief from Holden.
"Good to hear you three. Now pull back before the Empire gets word of this. See you all back at base!" he gently banked his fighter around toward the ground, intending to fly low once more to avoid detection. As he did so, he glanced at his shield and damage readouts, finding his fighter in pristine condition still. That said, his shields were down to just nine percent, sending a small shiver down his spine.
If that fighter had gotten just one more good linked blast on me… I woulda been cooked!
Kyra looked up from where she was on top of the Captain's fighter inspecting it's engines as she heard speeder engines, looking to the entrance of the hanger to see the two bikes crest the lip of the floor. Each bike only had one rider, easily recognizing Roy in his armor and Madelyn still in her street clothes and jacket. Both were coated in dirt and carbon, but seemed unharmed.
"Hey Kyra, let me know if you spot anything, I'm gonna go check in with Roy, kay?" The captain shouted that out from below her, where he was inspecting one of the lower engines on his fighter. She simply waved to him in response, watching as he trotted toward the Redeemer, where their compatriots were now shutting the bikes down at. Madelyn almost immediately was speaking.
"Hey Cappie! Tosh thinks there's a few other folk in the village that would want to join us too! He's back there talking to them!" though they were a good distance away, Kyra could still clearly hear them, sitting on the fuselage and bracing her feet on one of the upper engines of the X-wing to simply listen in.
"Cool! It's a start at least!" The captain sounded quite upbeat about the prospect, stopping beside the two of them. "What do you think about it Roy?"
Roy shook his head, his arms crossed. "I think I have enough untrained idiots to train as is. Give me a month, I'll make soldiers out of em. Tosh nearly got us killed out there."
"Oh, it's not like he missed. Actually, I was impressed by it! He pegged that guy at a click and half like it was as easy as popping a cherry."
"He acted without orders Stodel, and so did you for that matter! We wouldn't have had to deal with a counter attack if he had just waited five more seconds for me to tell him to fire! He's undisciplined and untrained, and you aren't much better!" Roy snapped at Madelyn, shaking his head in disgust.
"Whoa there Roy, hold your horses! He's just a farm kid, give him a chance." The captain physically stepped between the two of them, acting as a physical barrier.
"I'm just saying it was stupid to bring him. We should have done that one with just us sir."
"I understand how you feel Roy, you're used to working with the best of the best. But we won't have that out here. We have to work with what we can get."
"I know sir, you go to war with the army you have, not the army you want. Still, we could have handled that better. Imperials could have gotten a signal off. Plus, there are some things on that op that are bothering me. They had defenses, yeah, but they didn't have any of the usual sensors. By what we saw in the capital, that's not how this legion operates." Roy's voice was shockingly concerned, the sound of it unsettling Kyra as she sat and listened.
"Alright, well it's probably best if we lay low anyway. Madelyn, get the Redeemer prepped for launch, take it back to the village and pick up these recruits you mentioned. Roy, get a training regimen set up. I don't want any of them going to the field unless you think they are ready to. Sound fair?"
"does to me Cappie!" Madelyn smirked as she turned and pranced away up the ship's ramp.
"Well, it certainly makes me feel a little better about it. I just… I really don't like the idea of training civilians to fight…"
"I understand Roy. But remember, these guys are signing up for it. They won't be civilians once you're done training them."
Roy let out a small sigh, but gently nodded. "I know sir. And on that topic… I want to bring Kyra in on the training too. I loathe to admit it but… she was actually great in the fight against the pirates. Even being a mechanic, I'd trust her with my life, and I'm not saying that from our past encounters. She was terrified the whole time, but she put out effective fire, moved when she needed to, and followed the orders she was given when given them. I want her to be able to join on actual missions sir." Roy spoke much quieter this time, his eyes glancing over to her. His entire body was tense, one of his hands falling to the grip of his pistol.
I don't want to fight though… I've never wanted to kill anyone! She let out a sigh as her eyes dropped to her boots. But… if I had known how to, and been willing to fight then… she shuddered as her mother's face flashed through her mind, the smell of burning flesh so vivid to her even now that she wanted to vomit.
"She did handle just fine. But you kinda seem like you don't want to train her?"
"I don't sir. She's already been through enough in my opinion… but… I also do acknowledge the need for skilled fighters if we want to make this mission a success. I just…"
"You don't want her getting hurt again. I get it. Don't train her. I'm keeping her at the base as a mechanic from here on. It's what we brought her for anyway." The captain patted Roy's shoulder, smiling to him.
Kyra closed her eyes, finding herself wanting Roy to teach her. I don't want too… I shouldn't fight! But… if I learn how to, I can protect people… she shook her head as a debate flared up in her mind. As much as she didn't want to kill anyone again, she saw how much that town had been changed for the better. And it was because they had been willing to fight and kill to protect them.
"Copy that sir. I'll see if I can get in touch with Nexu. I can get ahold of some arms and equipment through them. Top of the line stuff, not normal alliance supply." Roy was clearly already moving on from that topic in their conversation, his body relaxing as his expression returned to his normally stern and business like persona.
Who am I kidding, I joined the rebellion to stop the Empire… and I can't stop them with harsh words and kindness… enough people have been hurt by them before. She cursed to her self as she stood up, stepping over the engine and across the fighter's wing before jumping off over the cannons.
"That would be awesome to have. How much do you think you could get us?"
"Enough to equip maybe two squads of troops. They may be able to point us to some places we could get more. I'd recommend holding on to what we get for our best operatives."
Kyra trotted up to the pair, neither noticing her
"Do it. And let me know what they say."
"Ye-"
"I want to fight." Her voice cracked as she spoke up, interrupting Roy. The pair both looked at her, slightly startled. While the Captain smiled to her, Roy visibly paled, a slight quiver visible as his eyes slowly widened.
"Kyra… no… you can't…"
"You said it yourself Roy, I have potential. I didn't join the Rebellion for nothing after all. I want to stop the empire, and the only way we are doing that is by fighting." Her body was trembling as she spoke, unable to even look at the captain as she directed her attention to Roy.
"I won't train you Kyra! I'm not letting what…" his voice froze for a moment, going even paler, though she couldn't understand why. When he finally continued, he was much quieter. "I'm not letting what was done to your family be done to you…"
"It won't! If I could have fought back the-"
"You would have lost and you would have been killed, not just shot!" Roy snapped that right back at her, cutting her off. He was still pale and trembling, but his voice was much more forceful, almost a shout actually.
"And how would you know that!?"
"I was there! That town was leveled by nearly a full battalion of stormtroopers! Even if you managed to get past the troops in your house, the rest of the troopers would have found you and killed you! No one survived that attack Kyra!" Roy's voice, though loud, was pitched with pain and panic, his eyes flicking between hers.
"you survived, didn't you? And so did I. if we had fought back…" she shuddered, the conversation bringing up so many painful memories it was hard to concentrate.
"Uh, guys… I'm still right here." The captain speaking broke her focus on Roy, looking to him. "And listen, I don't know your pasts, nor do I care about them. Roy, you can be a little reckless and brutal, but you can fight on the ground like no one else I've ever seen. And that's what I care about. Kyra, if you want to fight, I'm inclined to let you. Especially if you are trained by Roy here. But, if you don't want to you don't have to."
"I want to sir. I don't want to watch anyone else getting hurt."
"So it's settled, Roy, train her with the others."
"With all due respect si-"
"Cut the sir yes sir crap. We all know you really want to say 'kiss my ass'. You are training her and that's an order, got it?"
Roy let out a sigh, his eyes dropping to the floor. "Sir yes sir." His voice was quiet, defeated even.
"Good. Kyra, go finish the post flight on my fighter. Roy… just make sure you have what you need for training. I'm going to go talk to Lieutenant Hendon, tell him our current plans." The captain turned away as he finished, heading for one of the doorways at the back of the hanger.
Kyra herself let out a shuddering sigh, turning back toward the X-wing in question as she tried to focus her mind back on that task. She barely made it more than two steps.
"Kyra, wait…" Roy's voice was very quiet and timid, something she was still shocked to hear from him.
She took a deep breath before she turned around, trying her best to choose the perfect words to respond to him with. "You are not going to change my mind Roy. I know you want to protect me for… what ever your reason is. But it's not your choice whether I choose to fight or not. Got it?"
"I know Kyra…" he wasn't even looking at her, his mouth opening and closing several times. When he finally looked at her, there were tears about to spill out of his eyes. "But if you got hurt… especially if it was because I didn-"
"Stop. I told you, it's my decision. If you don't want me to get killed, make me the best soldier you've ever worked with." With that, she spun on her heel and stomped back toward the fighter, ducking under the cannons to approach the ladder still pushed up to the cockpit. She hesitated there though, looking back to where Roy was, still staring blankly at the floor. As she watched, all signs of emotion simply left him, his hands grabbing the rifle slung on his side as he trotted up the Redeemer's ramp, disappearing inside.
"Mom! What's going on!?" Kyra's heart was racing as her mother rushed through the main door of the house, echoing booms and screams audible through the open door. In the dark of the night beyond, there were flashes on the night sky, smoke visible in the air.
"Not now, you need to hide Kyra!" her mother sounded terrified as she rushed to Kyra's side, grabbing her hand and dragging her away from the door. They didn't make it more than three steps into the home when the lights in the home flickered and died, the hum of energy in the many appliances around the house shutting off.
"M-Mom!?" Kyra's voice quivered, the pair having come to a stop. She was looking up at her face, just a moment before light illuminated the pair, her mother's eyes going wide. There was a loud screech like sound, accompanying brilliant red light as a bolt of energy ripped through her mother's throat. In an instant, her throat was vaporized, filling the room with a brunt flesh smell that was so utterly revolting that Kyra was immediately nauseous as her mother clutched at the fresh wound. Brilliant red blood seeped past her fingers, her eyes falling to Kyra a moment before there was another shot, pain erupting from Kyra's shoulder so brilliantly that her vision went black instantly.
What felt like only a moment later, she struggled to open her eyes, finding her face just inches from her mother's throat. The parts of Kyra's face that were pressed on the floor felt slick with some sort of fluid. The burning smell from earlier was now mixing with a sickly sweet and coppery smell, as well as the tang of hot metal and ozone. The pain in her shoulder continued to violently throb, Kyra letting out a soft moan as she tried to get her mind to wrap around what was going on.
"Sir, building is clear. Found a male in the bedroom with a rifle. No casualties." The voice now speaking made Kyra's veins turn to ice, electronically distorted in a way she had only heard once before, when she had encountered a storm trooper for the first time. She risked looking toward the voice, seeing two of the white clad troopers, both with steaming weapons in hand. A third was visible behind them, leaving the house through the open door.
"Alright. Move on to the next one. I'll catch up, just reporting higher sergeant." The other trooper was speaking, his voice as distorted as the first's. the first simply nodded and stepped out of the door without a word. The one that remained started to visibly shake, slumping up against the wall and sliding to the ground, his weapon being dropped and forgotten. He dropped his head into his hands, his distorted voice muttering so quietly that she couldn't understand it.
"M-Mom?" she spoke as softly as she dared, not caring that a stormtrooper was right there. She forced herself to sit up, shaking her mother by the shoulder. Kyra's entire left side was covered in blood, the bright red liquid soaking her clothes. She could feel more leaking from her shoulder, the pain there indescribable. She wanted to simply scream out from that pain, only not doing so from shear force of will.
"Mom! Wake up! Please!" she shook her mother harder, despite it agonizing her shoulder even more.
"Yo-you're still alive!" the voice of the stormtrooper drew her attention back to him, seeing him now standing, weapon in hand and leveled on her. He was shaking even harder now, his armor clattering together from the force of it.
"Don't hurt her! P-please!" Kyra immediately threw herself over her mother, trying to shield her with her own body.
"She… your mother…" the stormtrooper's weapon slowly drooped downward until he let go of it with one hand, his arms completely slack. "Your mother is dead." Though his voice was muffled by the electronics in the helmet, there was a deep rooted sadness in it, one Kyra could literally feel resonating through the room.
"No! she can't be!" Kyra cried out, sitting up once more to continue shaking her mother, desperately trying to wake her up. "Come on! Wake up, please!" she sobbed as her mother never stirred, giving her no reaction. There was no rise and fall to her chest, not movement to her frame. Her mother's deep blue eyes were completely dilated, no spark of movement or reaction to the shifting light of the room, simply staring off into the void. "M…Mom…" her voice gave out on her as she crumbled over her mother's corpse, sobbing. Her entire body felt numb and hollow, not even able to feel the pain in her shoulder anymore.
"I'm on my way. One mic." The stormtrooper spoke once more, before she heard his feet leave the home, Kyra still sobbing. Minutes dragged on, slipping into what felt like lifetimes as she continued to hold her mother's body and cry, until the point that tears stopped falling, still sitting there.
"K-Kyra…" Her father's voice broke the silence, looking up to see him sitting on the floor, in the doorway to her parents bedroom. Given he hadn't been there earlier, she could only guess he had moved there while she was sobbing. His breath was short and shallow, his shirt tinged a dark red from a point in the center of his chest. "C-c-co-mme hee-ere." He clumsily beckoned her closer, Kyra not wanting to move. "I don't have long Kyra…" his voice was pained and weak, a strong rasp to each word
Kyra gently set her mother down, crawling to her father on her good arm.
He could barely keep his eyes on her, grabbing her face in his hand. "Listen to me… you need to leave… run toward the edge of the town… never look back, okay?" as his raspy voice rang out, he moved his other hand to her, a small cylinder in it she had only seen twice before. He pressed the object into one of her hands, confusing her. "This… this belonged to your mother… she would want you to have it… never use it to harm others, just to protect yourself…" his voice was nearly silent as he positioned the object in her hand, pointing it skyward as he moved her thumb over a small button on the side.
"I knoww you know-w how to u-use it. N-Now g-gg-go… g…go…" his voice slowly fell as he kept trying to repeat his statement. A moment later, his body took a deep shuddering breath before falling completely still, his hands falling to the floor. His eyes had taken on the same blank stare her mothers had.
Several more tears leaked out of Kyra's eyes, her focus bouncing between his eyes for several moments before she shakily closed his eyelids. When she finished, she stood, shambling over to her mother to do the same for her, before she shambled out of the back door, stopping just before she left to take on more look at her blood stained home. "G…good bye mom… dad… I…" she couldn't finish speaking, knowing they would have never heard her in the first place. They were long gone after all. With that, she left the home, shambling away without ever looking behind her.
Kyra startled awake, shuddering as sweat coated her body. Her dream… or more accurately, her memories still sharply vivid in her mind. She let out a sigh as she sat up, grabbing her tool bag off the floor beside her bed. After digging in it for a moment, she pulled out the object she was looking for, inspecting the matte grey metal as she tossed the cylinder between her hands. It was a simple slim tube, carved wood added around the center to form a comfortable and warm grip. On one side was a disk, the other a clip. She pointed the disk away from her as she adjusted her grip, her fingers finding the natural grooves worn into the wood as her thumb rested on the activation switch. She let out a shuddering sigh as she stared at the object, half debating activating it. it had been years since she did so, so she wasn't even certain if it worked anymore.
I promise you mom, dad, I'm not letting what happened to our family happen to anyone else… I miss you both so much… She quickly slipped the device away in her bag, tears stinging her eyes. A moment later, she was getting up, getting dressed and slinging the bag on her shoulder before leaving the room.