Jorec fired off two quick shots as the door opened, barely grazing the first Stormtrooper who opened the door, and quickly spun behind the cover of an evidence locker. He glanced to the right and saw red bolts of energy fly past his vision. Rinoco quickly walked to the cover, all four of his blaster pistols firing at the Stormtroopers.
"I got about two," Rinoco told Jorec as he leaned from his cover to keep the Stormtroopers at bay. "You?"
"I only grazed one," Jorec replied. "Where's Banth?"
"He caught one in the opening barrage. Didn't see where, just saw him go down."
Jorec squeezed a shot at a Stormtrooper, only for the shot to go wide of his target. Cursing as the retaliatory shots came in. One hit the locker a few centimeters from his face, burning a large hole in the metal. The rest flew harmlessly away from their intended target.
The Stormtroopers kept firing as they slowly advanced, another one of their numbers brought down by Rinoco's barrage.
"Jorec, they're advancing. Run to the next set of lockers, I'll cover for you."
Jorec nodded and when the Xexto sidestepped his way into the aisle, firing all of his blasters, ran backwards and finally took cover behind another set of lockers.
"Eight left," Rinoco exclaimed as he too finally reached the next aisle.
One minute later, the edges of the lockers were a twisted combination of melted metal and several impact holes, and no more Stormtroopers had been taken out. For the past 45 seconds, the gunfight had become a virtual stalemate, with both sides taking potshots from behind their cover.
"They're trying to wear us out," Jorec said as he avoided a few blaster shots that came dangerously close to hitting him.
"Looks like they're trading places at taking shots at us," Rinoco replied. "Any ideas on how to get out of this mess?" he asked Jorec.
Looking down at the lightsaber on the floor, Jorec nodded. He called it to his hand. "One, but it may not work."
"You're kidding, right? You said you haven't used that thing in years!"
"Do you have any better ideas?" Jorec asked as he took a shot at a Stormtrooper from behind his cover. "When I say 'go,' run to the next aisle and draw their fire."
"Well, seeing as we're going to die anyway if we keep this up do it," Rinoco said. "I'm ready."
Jorec closed his eyes for a second, and switched his weapons. "Need a little help here, Master," he whispered as he drew in the Force. He felt faster, both in his reflexes and his mind, and he felt confident that he could do what had to be done.
"Go!" Jorec yelled. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Rinoco move out into the open with all four of his blaster pistols blazing. Jorec leaped up to the top of the 2-meter tall evidence locker, igniting his lightsaber once he reached the top. The blue blade cast little light inside of the bright room, but Jorec saw the shine off of the blade despite this. He leaped across of the distance separating the two evidence lockers and soon he was looking down upon the eight Stormtroopers behind their cover. Two shots from his blaster pistol took out both the Stormtrooper he had wounded earlier and one without a helmet before they were even aware of his presence. Jorec dropped his blaster onto the floor and stretched out his left hand towards a group of three soldiers to the right, the three flew away from their cover and into the fire of Rinoco. He leaped down into the aisle and decapitated the two Stormtroopers he landed next to. The lone remaining Stormtrooper turned around and raised his rifle to shoot at the Jedi. The blade of the lightsaber twirled in Jorec's hand, first slicing the arms off of the white-armored figure in a failed attempt to sever the barrel, and then moving in a diagonal arc across the chest of the wounded trooper in one fluid movement. Behind him, Jorec could hear Rinoco shoot the last of the three troops he had pushed towards him. Certain that the threat was over, Jorec thumbed his lightsaber off, and slowly exhaled.
"By the Force!" Rinoco exclaimed as he turned to see the five bodies of the Stormtroopers that Jorec had killed. "You did all of that?"
"Exactly," Jorec replied as he felt himself return to normal. "By the Force… How's Banth?"
Rinoco walked over to his fallen comrade. "Not too good… He's alive, but I don't know for how long."
Jorec jogged to the fallen body of Banth, studying the blaster wound in the human's midsection. He had seen a wound similar to this three years previously, the result of a dreadful hunting accident in the woods of Selvernos, but here there was no quick call to the nearest medcenter and no emergency airspeeder.
"O...ana," Banth tried to say as Jorec kneeled over him, his breathing becoming more labored. He wasn't going to last very long.
"What did he try to say?" Rinoco asked as he quickly searched the room for any sort of medical kit.
"Organa," Banth was finally able to say.
Organa. The name seemed familiar to Jorec, an Alderaanian senator that always seemed to be a friend to the Jedi.
"Bail Organa?" Jorec asked to the dying man, hoping to get any clues from him.
Banth nodded his head. "Jedi, I helped hide them…If you survive, go to Alderaan…" With those last words, Banth's breathing slowed to a stop.
Rinoco let out a defeated sigh. "With the way things are going, I don't think we're going to survive. I doubt any ships in the hangar would have survived the crash, and I know we can't kill everyone aboard a rescue ship."
"We have to try," Jorec said as he stood up. "I may have been ready to die when I was captured, but I'm not going to let this opportunity be marred by defeatism. I think I survived this crash for a reason. Besides, we were able to survive." Jorec pointed to the bodies of the Stormtroopers on the floor. "They were able to survive, surely there must be other prisoners."
"I wish I could share your optimism, Jedi," Rinoco replied as he grabbed the energy cell from Banth's gun. He spoke a few words in his own language and then turned back to Jorec. "But we barely survived this. Who knows how many more of them are out there?"
"Says the one who killed most of Stormtroopers here," Jorec replied as he pointed to Rinoco's four blaster pistols. "Besides, you fight better than a simple political dissident should fight."
Rinoco had to grin, and let out some high-pitched laughter. "That's for sure. When I said 'A little outspoken in my beliefs,' I meant something to the effect of 'I bombed a few Imperial vehicles, attacked a few supply depots, and various other methods of mayhem.'"
Jorec raised his eyebrows in response to Rinoco's confession, and traded his blaster pistol for one of the fallen Stormtrooper's E-11's.
Bail Organa, he thought as he walked out of the partially destroyed evidence room. I wonder if I can trust him. He's always seemed to be a friend of the Jedi, but then again I think we believed Palpatine to be the same way. Oh well, I can worry about this later. Right now I have to worry about getting off of this planet we crashed on, and getting back to Selvernos. There's someone I need to see there, and she needs to know the truth about me…