Exodus
- Mission Vao -
I'd tried, so many times, to get Big Z to take a bath. I'd even succeeded once, although freaking years later and he still complained about it. A Wookiee does not bathe, Mission! What humiliation will you use on me next? A comb? Still, he had nothing on twenty odd of his countrymen, all crammed together in a freight elevator specced to take about half that number.
Canderous figured the safety margin should allow us to double the weight. Of course, we weren't gonna test it personally – not on the first run, anyway.
I wasn't meant to be here.
…
"You're not going to sneak down to the Shadowlands, are you?" Dustil asked.
"What?" I looked up from the armour straps I was struggling with. "No! No, you heard Canderous." It might have the shine of adventure about it, but I'd heard too much about that place. Flying insects with fangs. Spiders the size of loth-cats. Giant plants known to gobble up whole Wookiees if they weren't careful. 'Sides, Canderous had made it clear he expected Dustil and me back on the 'Hawk once we'd played our part – and while I had no problem ignoring Big Z, Canderous was a different skillet of scalefish. I had the teensiest feeling I'd end up regretting it.
Dustil was staring at me, doubtfully, and I wrinkled my nose. "I won't, alright? I mean, I'm dead worried about Big Z an' all, and then there's Jen…" I trailed off, frowning. She'd be okay, I reckoned, but Canderous didn't seem to think so.
"The Mandalorian seemed a bit concerned about her," Dustil muttered, echoing my thoughts. He looked away, absently handling a lightweight Echani blaster from the storage hold.
"Yeah, well, those two are kinda involved," I said, scowling at the stupid clasp that wouldn't close. Big Z had done a great job modding ole Calo's armour to fit me, but it was such a pain to get on. Suddenly, I realized what I'd let slip, and glanced back to Dustil in shock.
"What, those two?" he spluttered, his dark eyes wide. "Frakk, I never would have picked it."
"Er-" I could feel a blush forming. "Um, don't say anything, alright? Jen's pretty cagey about it. I don't think anyone actually knows."
"Anyone knows about what?" Canderous drawled, stomping into the cargo hold. I jumped, and Dustil looked away. Canderous raised an eyebrow, before snorting at our lack of response. "Czerka's starting to load the cargo onto the freighter. It's time to roll out, kids."
…
I stared at the tallest Wookiee, the loud scraggly one growling about untrustworthy off-worlders as he eye-balled me, and swallowed. I edged deeper into a corner of the descending lift. There was a rattling noise from within the ceiling, and I tried not to think about how far down we still had to go.
I'll be fine. It'll be okay. We'll get to the bottom, the Wookiees'll clear out, and I'll ride back to the top. Canderous was still there. Between him and the remaining prisoners, they had to have the place secure. Dustil - well, I hadn't seen him. He'd probably snuck back to the 'Hawk as planned. Canderous didn't trust him - and, truth be told, I didn't entirely myself. Carth's son was plenty smart and dangerous, but I kinda thought that he looked after himself first.
Although, Dustil had agreed to the riskier job – sneaking onboard with that wizard power of his and releasing the droids from the containers we'd used to smuggle them in.
Canderous and I – we could always bail if things went chuba-shaped.
At least that was the plan.
…
"You got the plan, kid?" Canderous asked, pulling hard on the last loose strap of my armour before thumping me on the back. I choked slightly. "Do what I say, when I say. If we run into trouble with Czerka, let me do the talking." He walked around to face me, deep lines etched into his forehead. "I've got a cover, Mission. If things kriff up, you shut up and play along. Got it?"
"Yeah, yeah," I muttered. Turned out Canderous had already infiltrated the tower earlier, when he'd gone out scouting with Teethree. Under the guise of an Exchange agent wanting to chat about reconciliation with Czerka or something. I'd forgotten Canderous used to work for the Exchange under Davik Kang, that slimy marsh-toad whose fat fingers had dabbled in just about every nasty thing going on in the Lower City. "How'd you end up as one of Davik's men, anyway?"
"I was after credits, and he wanted the manpower," Canderous said. He hefted his repeating blaster, and began striding toward the exit of the Ebon Hawk. "It was beneath me, really. A bit like driving a spike through your head. Sure, you've got something new in there, but in the end, you've lost something as well."
I sniggered.
Canderous paused by the hatch, before turning back to face me. He looked more serious than normal. "The Sithkid's already begun his part. Don't do anything stupid, ad'ika, and this might just work."
…
It'd worked, so far. I kept reminding myself of that, even as the howls around me grew ever louder.
I'd thought my Shyriiwook was good. I could pretty much get everything Big Z said – but it turned out having a whole bunch of angry Wookiees arguing at the same time wasn't quite so easy to follow.
The one next to me, a bowed one with dappled grey fur, had been at my side since the lift doors closed. I had the feeling Grey-fur had some understanding of Basic, for I'd been screaming I was helping them when the first wave of Wookiees swarmed into the lift, murder in their gaze.
I wasn't meant to be hacking from the elevator access panel. I wasn't meant to be here. And to think, our part had started off so well-
…
"Did we have to kill them?" I whispered, staring down at the dead body. Half his face was grisly and melted. It made me feel like puking, and I looked away.
"Next time, shall I ask them to step aside and pretend we ain't here?" Canderous mocked from deeper in the room. He was crouching as he methodically searched the warm corpse of a tech who, moments ago, had been innocently tapping keys behind a console.
"No, look, it's just-" I stopped, not really sure what I was trying to say. These guys here, they were just workers. Admins. Doing their job, before we sliced into the service entrance and opened fire. It felt wrong – even with the weight of a hundred Wookiee lives in the balance. "I dunno. Couldn't we just have stunned them?"
"Mission," Canderous said, and he sounded irritated now as he stomped back to me. "There's only two of us to secure the area. We don't have time to tie anyone up in case the stun wears off. And we especially don't have time for you to start mourning some dead Czerka grunts."
I scowled, and he jerked his head toward the nearest console.
"Get your arse behind that, kid."
"I'm not a kid," I grumped, and thought I saw his mouth twitch. He was right – even if he was annoying – and I ran toward the blood spattered console.
…
"(These off-worlders are soulless madclaws that defile our planet,)" Tall-scraggly growled. I heard a half-dozen rumbles in response, all unintelligible and mixed in together. The sound of them speaking at the same time hurt my ears. Tall-scraggly howled louder, still glaring at me. "(Slavers, planet-rapers – we should not allow any of them to live on our world!)"
I pressed myself tight against the chrome walls. It couldn't be long, surely, until we hit the bottom. The Wookiees could file out, and I'd ride back to the top.
Half of them were injured. All of them were crazed. I supposed I'd be, too, if my chieftain had sold me into slavery just to get rid of me – but sheesh, I was on their freaking side!
"(You heard the metal-robot,)" Grey-fur spoke. It was the first time I'd heard her – I thought it was a her, but really, I couldn't be sure – say something. "(The blue cub is one of them. An off-worlder who has risked much to help us, Chorrawl.)"
Chorrawl huffed, and shook his head irritably. He had to have at least fifty pounds on Big Z. An arm hung limply at his side, the fur matted with blood.
The Wookiees left topside would be facing the rallying Czerka troops. Some would die, I knew. I hoped that Big Z would approve of our plan. He always said death was better than slavery. Sheesh, I hope he meant it.
"(We cannot trust any off-worlder,)" Chorrawl growled. A Wookiee next to him nodded in agreement. "(Not even harmless blue-skinned girl-cubs.)"
My hands were laid flat against the metal of the lift. I could hear my heart beat resoundingly in my ears. If only I'd had more time-
…
The system was EliteSec, a variant of the IntelliSecurity OS I'd cut my teeth on back on Taris. It was familiar enough that I felt comfortable, but still – it would have been quicker for Teethree. Dustil needed his slicing skills, though. Freeing the Wookiees would be a harder task than overriding the lifts.
My gaze narrowed on the screen, and I began to smile as I inserted a tech spike and got to work. First stop, as always, surveillance.
There were holo-cams in engineering admin – tech was so cheap these days that most corporations installed cams even in the freaking loos – but it wasn't like they'd finance the manpower to actively watch them. The recorded vid would sit in an archive somewhere, to be retrieved only if there was a need for it.
Unless someone, of course, deleted it first.
I smirked, erasing the last hour of footage and setting the cams on a replay loop from the hour previous. That was enough that if someone did glance at them they might be fooled for a bit. "Cams are sorted."
I heard Canderous drag a body somewhere out of sight as I turned my attention to the mechanical functions of the building. Most OS's were interconnected – get to the root, and you could access just about any system. I just had to find the lift functions, before Dustil came running with a hundred angry Wookiees.
Hopefully, HK would tell them what was going on. It felt dodgy, trusting communication to that evil robot, but he was the only one who spoke Shyriiwook. I'd wondered, aloud, if it would make more sense for me to go – there had to be at least one Wookiee who understood Basic, and surely I'd be a safer translator than psycho-droid – but Canderous flat-out refused to let me anywhere near that freighter.
He was the one who'd demanded I wear Calo's ugly armour in the first place. Sheesh, at times he was getting as bad as Big Z and Carth. Not that I'd ever tell him that.
I switched control to the transportation function. There. Elevator A and B. I wondered which one was ours, as I scrolled through the lift specifications. "So, this thing has a max weight of three and a half thousand pounds. Um…"
"Huh, that's a good sized lift. Guess the mercs taken enough gear down with this," Canderous commented, his weapon held loosely in his grasp as he strode back to face the inner door. "Don't suppose you ever got Carpet on a set of scales?"
"Hard enough to get him to brush his teeth," I muttered, browsing the initialization routines available. There were two doors leading into the lift, and we were aiming for the secondary entrance – the cargo door. I needed to seal the main one, stop any Czerka mercs from coming in that way.
"Let's assume three-fifty standard, that's ten Wookiees to hit the max. We should be able to double that, safety standards being what they are," Canderous mused. I heard a faint buzz, followed by an electronic click. "Incoming text feed from Sithkid. The bucket droid's done it, and the Wookiees are on the move. You gotta work your magic now."
"Yep, one sec," I murmured absently, shutting down the primary doors on both lifts. I could hack a route into the access functions, but I needed to know which one was ours, and even worse-
"Mission, it's gonna turn into a bloodbath out there. You ain't got time-"
"Bantha crap," I spluttered. "Canderous, its voice activated. I gotta get in the lift-"
"I thought you said you could hack it, kid!"
"Yeah, but it's gonna take time we don't have," I snapped. "I'm not an astromech. Far quicker if I get to the lift controls, I can nullify the primary access method from there and find an override-"
"Haar'chak," Canderous cursed, before talking into his wrist. "Dustil, the service entrance is unlocked. We're moving to the lift."
…
The Wookiees had swarmed into the room before I'd finished. Canderous had secured the area, hollered at me to get out, now!, but even he was taken aback at just how quick a bunch of Wookiees could move.
I'd been surrounded by a crowd of injured, roaring, seven-foot hairballs before I knew what was happening, and then one of them shoved me fiercely to the side and mashed his great big furry paw on the control panel.
I'd scrabbled to my feet, engulfed in a forest of hairy, smelly legs. The lift doors began to close; I yelled in surprise and tried to push my way forward.
I wasn't quick enough.
And now…
"(We will find Freyyr, if he still lives, and then we shall drive all off-worlders from Kashyyyk forever!)" Chorrawl snarled. "(No more starports, no more trade, no more Czerka!)"
The elevator erupted into loud roars of agreement, and I clapped my hands over my ears. Surely, surely, we were almost at the end.
"(No more off-worlders!)" I picked that line up, from a heavy-set one with mad gleaming eyes. He raised a hand to point at me. The harsh lighting in the lift glinted from exposed claws. "(Starting with that one!)"
Fright spiked deep into my belly. I stared at the mad Wookiee, wishing desperately that Big Z or Jen or even Canderous were here with me. I'm really in the poodoo now!
"(Silence!)" Grey-fur's voice lashed out, loud and commanding, and to my surprise the mood of the Wookiees immediately settled. Several heads swivelled to stare at her. There was a constipated look on Chorrawl's face – kinda like Big Z when he didn't get his eight meals a day - but most of the rest were watching Grey-fur in a sort of anticipation. Like she was a leader or something.
"(We must fight, Tasharr,)" Chorrawl growled. "(I will go against you if you advise any sort of delay. Now is the time for war, to drive these madclaw outsiders-)"
"(Chorrawl,)" the one called Tasharr spoke over him. Her voice was low and gravelly, but still seemed to hold an air of authority. "(We have all suffered humiliation that no living being should. We have all had the truth laid bare in front of our eyes of what Chuundar has been doing to our world. I agree that we must act to protect Kashyyyk-)"
The Wookiees roared again. Tasharr had stepped mostly in front of me, and I could only hope they would forget I was there. I crouched back, trying to look as small and unintimidating as possible. I'd seen Big Z lose his temper before, but this lot looked feral. Crazed.
"(-but we must think with our head as well as our heart. We are not madclaw.)" With that, she turned to stare at the wider Wookiee, the one who had his claws out. He shuffled, and slipped his hands behind his back. Tasharr huffed in satisfaction. "(If we allow off-worlders and a corrupt chieftain to turn us into that, then they have already won.)"
The crowd dissolved into silence. Chorrawl lifted a paw to scratch at his head, and the heavyset one looked down. Whoever Tasharr was, she held some sort of power over the others, and I was beginning to realize she might be my only hope of safety.
"(So what do you advise, Old One?)" Chorrawl rumbled. Now that the rest had quietened and it was only those two speaking, I had a better time following the conversation.
"(As you said. We find Freyyr, should he still walk this world. We drive Czerka off. But we fight with honour, and we do not go after those who are no threat. Particularly those who may actually be our ally.)"
And with that, she turned her back on the crowd, and stared at me with dark eyes. She was bowed with age, and short for a Wookiee besides, and yet she still towered over me. Her fur was oily and matted with dirt, and it made me wonder just how long they'd been kept in the freighter.
"(You understand our language,)" she mused, staring at me in consideration. How had she picked up on that? "(And the metal-robot who helped remove us from our prison said this was your idea. Why?)"
I couldn't believe I was actually grateful for something HK had said. I nodded, a bit desperately. "Well, I mean, it's what Big Z would've wanted, he always said slavery was worse than death, and he was so upset when he saw what happened to his world since he left, and then he disappeared into the Shadowlands after I told him about his dad and the slaves, and I just wanted to do something…"
I was rambling, words tumbling out, tangling over the top of each other in half-panic. Tasharr frowned, thick brows slamming together in confusion over my garbled answer. She wouldn't know who Big Z was, and I didn't think dropping Zaalbar's name would help me here. He was labelled a madclaw, after all, even if these guys were completely wrong and dumb for calling him one-
There was a rumble of growing irritation from the others.
"My best friend is a Wookiee," I said helplessly. "He would do the same for me."
Tasharr's face cleared, as much as a Wookiee's could, and she gave me a brief nod. "(Even off-worlders can have honour,)" she said softly. "(We must remember that, when-)"
The elevator thudded to a halt, and I stumbled against the wall. There was a loud, mechanical creak as the doors began to open.
My breath stuck in my throat like I'd drunk too much fizz-pop, and I pressed myself tighter against the wall. The Wookiees, as one, lapsed into a tense silence as they all turned to face the opening exit.
A sliver of darkness appeared. It widened, as the doors slid open.
"What the-?" a foreign voice called out in confusion, from deep within the gloom.
"(Czerka filth!)" It was a roar, load and furious in Shyriiwook, and the rest answered in thunderous agreement that echoed through the chrome-walled lift.
"Frakk!" someone yelled, as the mass of furious Wookiee muscle surrounding me surged forward. Berserking howls grew to ear-splitting volume all around me. But as they all jostled to exit, I heard a different sound: blaster fire.
I screamed, as a shot ricocheted from the ceiling to ping next to my head, before burning into Tasharr's arm.
"(Kill the slavers!)" a Wookiee snarled, echoed by his kin as they tumbled out into the thick, black shadows.
The doors! I scrabbled sideways, back to the lift console. Tasharr, clutching at a hairy limb, looked back to me. She was the only one left in the lift.
"Go! I'll ride back up!" I cried. My hand grabbed the side of the access panel as she gave a curt nod, and then turned to follow the others.
The sound of something small and metal dribbling against the lift floor caught my attention. As my hand mashed against the topside button, my brain recognized the object that had been thrown into the lift.
A grenade. Just starting to emit the first puffs of green poison.
Bantha crap! My stomach bottomed out. I jerked my gaze back to the lift doors, which were starting to close. The black outside was shot through with red spits of laser. I only had one choice.
I ran into the Shadowlands.
Howls and screams resonated in all directions. The doors closed behind, killing off the only source of light, other than the flashes of guns as they discharged.
I had no visor. I couldn't see a thing.
"Boda, Aldirik, pull back, there's too many of the bastards!"
Someone crashed into me, and I fell to the ground with a squeak. A hand enclosed around my ankle and I screamed, kicking back in instinct before scrabbling away.
I heard a grunt behind me. Something nearby exploded, and harsh light stabbed into my eyes. A wave of heat hit my exposed face. Somewhere, someone howled.
"Czerka don't pay us enough for this crap!"
I was on my feet, running blindly, panting, my heart in my throat. I had to hide, had to get away from the blaster shots and the grenades and all of this-
I tripped over something in the darkness.
I fell, twisting sharply on an unsteady wrist. My head hit the forest floor, and a wad of dirt or something like it mashed against my face. Desperation coursed like fire through my veins, I was already scrabbling away somewhere, anywhere, fingers clawing frantically into the moist ground.
"Hey!"
The air was humid and sticky. Hot tears blurred my vision, cast in varying shades of black. With a panicked grunt, I was back on my feet, running forward blindly.
"A little Twi'lek joygirl here?"
Something hard thumped into my back, and I collapsed with a shocked cry.
"Quick, Boda, take her and let's get out of here!"
I was yanked up roughly, there was a rough blow at the back of my head, and then I knew no more.
xXx
