LordDarthYoda - I know that joke is funny (and I laughed) but it does go to show that I've used that trope a bit too often. It's something I'm going to keep in mind going forward. As for your question, I don't think Jango would like these guys. Jango always struck me as having something of a conscience (Boba, not so much) and Coren Vox is pretty much bringing the whole Mandalorian name into disrepute. Though Jango was friends with Aurra Sing and Hondo Onaka so...he wasn't exactly a paragon of integrity either.
Mr. Insane - I think any situation where your a hostage is never 'good' but they could have easily been dead instead of hostages so thats certainly a silver lining. I think Coren just wants the hell off Ubrora, and you can't really blame him!
SpeechBubbleMe - Vash is certainly not a 'goes down with his ship' sort of captain, that's for sure. *cough* Coward *cough*
A/N - So this chapter was supposed to be the end of the battle, but as I was editing it, I just hated the way that it ended. It was just too abrupt. On Monday I finally got an idea which I quite liked for ending this whole thing in a more satisfactory manner...but it wasn't enough time for me to write fully. So I have to leave you with another cliffhanger, for which I do apologize. But I'd rather take my time and publish something good than publish something incomplete just to 'finish' something. And I hope you do too. So the battle for Ubrora concludes with the next chapter.
Anyways, all reviews, follows, and favourites are deeply appreciated as always.
Please enjoy the next chapter.
Chapter 60: The Battle for Ubrora, Part Five
Aurine Brynar had observed on many different occasions how nerve fraying it was to experience a fight through a connection in the Force. She could generally get a sense of how the fight was going for Sascha through their connection and today was no different. In short it was going badly. As her connection to Sascha weakened, she knew that was shorthand for him losing the fight.
Aurine clenched her hands into fists. Why couldn't this speeder go faster! It was so immensely frustrating to be removed from this battle. She was supposed to be with her Padawan, fighting by his side, not racing to his aid!
"They are losing the fight," Tiplee stated matter-of-factly. The worst part was, she was right.
"How far away are we?"
Tiplee grimaced, "Too far."
Her connection with Sascha continued to weaken as her Padawan took what she could only assume was a vicious beating. She wondered what would happen when he died. Would her body go cold? Would she be driven to madness, to rage?
"They won't kill them. At least not Sascha," said Tiplee as if she could read her mind.
"Why not?"
Tiplee was driving a bit slower now, Aurine noticed. Perhaps she had accepted the inevitable. Or more likely, Nara's dimming presence in the Force had made it more difficult for the Rishati to find her way to wherever the battle was. "Why won't the Mandalorians kill them the first chance they get?"
"Because they need leverage to get off this planet. I don't know where the ship that they took to get to Ubrora landed, but I can tell you its not in the middle of this forest. Maybe they left their ship on the Reprisal. Maybe its somewhere else. Short story is they are likely trapped."
"So they take the Padawans hostage." Aurine winced as through the Force she felt Sascha took what felt like a crushing blow. And then a couple more. If she had to bet, she would have bet on him being incapacitated at this point, if not outright unconscious.
"They may still kill Nara, just to hurt me. But Coren is a vicious one. He'll want me to suffer. So for that reason, I think she might be safe...for the time being."
Those were some dire words being offered by Tiplee. Aurine wished that she could say that this was the first time Sascha had been captured and close to death, but it hadn't. He'd also been captured by the fanatical fallen Jedi known as Weliss. That encounter had almost ended terribly for Sascha. She had saved him at the last possible moment from a certain demise. She'd sworn not to let that happen again, but here she was.
"The Padawans have been defeated," said Tiplee as she brought the speeder slowly to a halt.
A lump formed in Aurine's throat. "I agree," she said. Sascha's presence in the Force was now terribly spotty and consistent with him being unconscious, or close to it.
My poor Padawan, beaten to a pulp again. Why kind of Master are you? thought Aurine.
She shook that thought out of her head. The assigning of blame could come later, "What's our next move?" she asked Tiplee.
"We head towards the Emerald Dream and see if we can cut the Mandalorians off. I think that is where Coren Vox will go. He'll see if the ship can fly."
Aurine nodded, "You're the one that knows Coren. I'll call Pravin and see if I can get the exact coordinates."
But before she could do that, her comlink rang. She looked at who the call was from. It was from Nara's comlink. She froze for a moment. There was no way that was actually Nara calling them. That meant the call was from Coren Vox. Aurine signaled to Tiplee to pay attention and put the call on speaker.
"Coren Vox, I presume," she said.
"Well done, Jedi," said the accented, metallic voice of Coren Vox. "I'll get straight to the point. I have something that belongs to both of you, so I'm going to pull from the Jedi playbook. I want to negotiate. You want your Padawans back. I want off this rock. I'm sure we can come to an agreeable compromise."
Aurine looked at Tiplee. The Rishati was tense, almost seeming as if she was ready to pounce. "We want both Padawans, Coren."
"Yes, I assumed that would be part of the deal. Which is the only reason your insolent Togruta apprentice is still alive," remarked Coren coldly. "Though I admit she is a bit...damaged at the moment. Probably best if she got some medical attention relatively soon."
It didn't take a genius to see through Coren's threat - Either give in to what I want or the Togruta gets it. And if you delay, well, Nara might just die anyway. All the cards were in Coren's hand, and the Mandalorian knew it.
"Do you want to discuss terms now or later, Coren?" asked Tiplee.
"Oh I think negotiations are better in person," Coren said dryly. "Meet us at where the ship of yours crashed. The two of you should come alone."
The call ended with a click.
"Well. I suppose that makes this simple," said Aurine.
Tiplee stayed silent, motionless.
Aurine cast a worried look at her partner. "Tiplee?"
"I should offer myself in exchange," she said quietly.
"Excuse me?"
"I should offer myself to Coren in exchange for the lives of our apprentices," Tiplee said. "He'll accept. Coren is motivated by revenge. He'll want to exact his revenge against me. We could just give it to him."
Aurine held her hands up, "Hold on. Tiplee, we can't actually be thinking about giving in to Coren. The man was a wanted murderer and escaped criminal before he came to Ubrora. Now he's arguably a war criminal. The fact that he has our Padawans is irrelevant. He must be stopped and brought to justice. There will be no trades. There is only us getting our Padawans back and bringing him to justice. That is the only way this end.s"
Tiplee's jaw worked but she said nothing. For once, Aurine thought that she saw things clearly. She would do just about anything to protect her apprentice, or any Jedi really. But while in a perfect world, she and Tiplee would be able to bring Coren to justice while saving their apprentices, they had to be logical about all this. They couldn't just let Coren get away. It would be unfathomable. But they had very little time to plan this out. The longer they delayed, the longer Coren had to change his mind.
"Tiplee, are we on the same page here?" she asked.
The Rishati took a moment and then finally nodded, "Yes. Our priority is the Padawans, but not at the expense of letting Coren go."
She clasped Tiplee on the shoulder, "We can do this. We are Jedi Knights. They are the scum of the galaxy."
Tiplee grinned and slapped herself on her chest, "Sometimes I do feel like I need to be reminded of that. Lets show those Mandalorians why the Jedi always beat Mandalorians. Call Pravin. I have a plan."
After a short, trip where Aurine had to tell Pravin to put a hold on whatever reinforcements he had arranged to be sent (which seemed to greatly confuse the General), the Jedi made their way to the Emerald Dream's crash site. It really wasn't difficult to track where the Dream had crashed. All they had to do was follow the many, many trees the the Dream had knocked down during its decent.
When they found the Dream itself, Aurine could see that the ship was dotted with the dying embers of a few fires, though most of the fires appeared to have extinguished already. The front end of the ship showed significant damage, and at the halfway point of the ship it had almost cracked in half. Only the ship's toughness had saved it.
Standing a fair distance from the ship were the Mandalorians. There was only five of them now, so either one was being kept in reserve, which Aurine discounted as unlikely, or the Padawans had managed to...subdue one of the Manadlorians during their brief battle.
Just in front of the Mandalorians were the Padawans. And they were in rough shape.
Sascha was in a kneeling position, a blaster pointed at his head. By the way he was swaying on his knees, Sascha was conscious, but only in the loosest possible sense of the word. Blood was visible on the main part of his robe, and a cut from just above his eye was dripping down his face, off his nose, and to the ground. His right eye also appeared to be swelling closed. It might have been the most damaged she had ever seen her Padawan, and it made her both angry at those that would inflict harm to her Padawan and angry at herself for letting it happen.
Nara was in worse shape than Sascha. Nara had been laid out on her back just in front of the Mandalorians, her eyes closed and her breathing shallow. Nara's face was bloodied and swollen and her robe was ripped, torn and dirty. The Togruta was clearly unconscious and if Aurine had to bet, she had been so for some time. At some point things switched from 'being temporarily knocked' to 'in a coma' and Aurine feared that Nara was currently into the latter category.
Coren Vox stepped forward and held a hand up, Tiplee took that as the signal to come no further.
"Turn off the speeder," called Coren through his amplified voice.
Tiplee complied.
"Exit the speeder but do not approach. You will stay there while we discuss terms," said Coren as he lazily sauntered over to Nara's prostrate body and poked at Nara's midsection with his right boot, "Or the Togruta gets it."
Off to her left, Tiplee was trying very hard to restrain her anger. Hate was almost visible in her eyes. And a bit of fear, probably coming from her having to watch her motionless apprentice. Aurine reached out and touched her shoulder lightly, a signal to stay calm. Tiplee's eyes locked with hers and she nodded. The Rishati's eyes turned back to normal.
She returned her attention to Coren. "What are your terms, Coren?" she asked. "We can have a ship come down upon your request."
"Good. I will require a ship with a hyperdrive and no tracking devices 'cleverly' installed on it. I will require it in the next ten minutes. Once the ship is inspected and meets with my specifications we will take the Padawans with us until we reach a safe distance from Ubrora. Then we will release them into an escape pod."
"And what assurances do we have that you won't just take our Padawans and jump to hyperspace?"
Coren crouched, "My word."
"Your word is worth nothing, Coren Vox," sneered Tiplee.
"Bold words, Jedi Knight Tiplee. And yet I have not killed either of your Padawans when it was in my power to do so," he said reasonably. "And I am making a deal with a Jedi which I would like to carve into tiny pieces. So either my word is worth something and we make a deal, or my word is worth nothing and I execute your Padawans and then we fight."
Tiplee started slowly sliding off to her left, which was a signal that they had agreed upon before hand would signal that they would fight. That suited Aurine Brynar just fine. However, she decided that she would try to play a bit of a delaying tactic. "I agree with your idea in principal. As a show of good faith, give us one of the Padawans. You will still have a very valuable hostage."
Coren went over to where Sascha was being held up. The Mandalorian ran an armored hand through his hair in a mockery of a comforting gesture. "No. I will not release either of the two whelps to you. As a show of good faith however, I will return their lightsabers to you. Here, catch." Coren took the two lightsabers that he had been carrying and threw them lazily towards the two Jedi Knights, clearly not intending for them to reach all the way to them. The two lightsabers got stuck in the muddy ground and came to a halt.
If that action had been designed to provoke the two Jedi, Coren would have to be be disappointment. "May I take out my comlink and call for a ship?" she asked.
"You can, but remember..." Coren drove his fist into Sascha's unprotected midsection. Sascha's eyes bulged for a moment, then seemed to roll back into his head as he collapsed backwards into the dirt. "If you do something I don't like your Padawan pays the price."
Watching Coren Vox be so casually cruel to a pair of teenagers that he had captured only underscored to Aurine what had been obvious since the beginning. There was no negotiation in good faith with Coren Vox. Only a delaying of the inevitable confrontation.
Aurine withdrew her comlink and mimicked speaking into it. What she and Tiplee were really doing was preparing their opening move in this battle, a Force push. But not just any random Force push like she could almost do in her sleep, but a push that was both wide enough in terms of area and strong enough in terms of force to buffet back all five Mandalorians significantly. If they managed a good enough push together, it would allow Aurine and Tiplee to close the distance between them and their Padawans and get into a position to protect them. That was the first part of their plan – protect the Padawans.
The second part of the plan was to subdue Coren Vox, by any means necessary.
Aurine continued to speak animatedly into the comlink, trying to buy time.
In the Force, Aurine found calmness and strength. She also found the strength of her compatriot. Tiplee's focus was completely laser sharp. It was the focus of a predator tracking her prey. That all encompassing desire that made predators like Rishati so very dangerous. And Rishati turned Jedi Knights even more so.
To compliment Tiplee's focus, Aurine brought another emotion that focused her. Compassion. Compassion for the two injured Padawans. Compassion for a world that so desperately needed to be free of thugs like Coren Vox. And even compassion for herself, for the person that she had lost during these past few weeks.
The Force emerged from her and Tiplee like a tidal wave, ripping up parts of the grass as the pure energy flew towards the unsuspecting Mandalorians. Their titanic Force push lifted both the Padawans and the Mandalorians from the ground and flew them several metres backwards. All the Mandalorians landed hard, because they had been given no way to anticipate being lifted off their feet and flown for a fair distance. Sascha, who had at least been able to sense the push coming, had curled into a ball to try to prevent taking any further damage. But Nara...Nara was simply a rag doll and the way that she landed, she probably broke her left arm in the fall.
As soon as the Force push had been completed, the Jedi charged. Aurine raced forward with all her will powering her. She flew like a sand panther after it had rustled its prey out of hiding.
But Tiplee was faster still.
The Rishati flattened her body out as she ran, making her far more aerodynamic than Aurine could ever be. After only a few seconds of sprinting, Tiplee had outpaced her by almost 40 feet. Then Tiplee jumped towards the two Padawans like a champion long jumper, covering what was a frankly insane amount of distance amazingly quickly. By the time that the Mandalorians recovered from being unceremoniously pushed back by the Force, Tiplee was standing guard over the still-unconscious Nara Nalto and daring anyone to attack her. Aurine, who was not quite as swift as Tiplee, managed to get into a similar position above Sascha not too long thereafter.
For a moment, there was a standoff as the four other Mandalorians looked to Coren for instructions. Aurine thought that the Mandalorians might choose to flee and fight another day. Then Coren pointed towards them, "Kill them all! Take out the Jedi and their whelps! For Mandalore!"
"For Mandalore!" the others echoed.
The Jedi said nothing. For there was nothing to be said.
For a thousand generations, the Jedi had fought against the Mandalorians. Sometimes in out and out wars where billions died. Sometimes in little skirmishes like this. This was another chapter in the epic history that was the Jedi-Mandalorian feud. Insignificant in historical terms. But very important to the current participants.
Coren Vox cocked something on his vambrace and fired it towards her and Sascha. Aurine grabbed the scruff of Sascha's robe and dove away from...whatever Coren was firing at her. Knowing how varied the sorts of weapons that Mandalorians carried it could have been anything from a poison dart to a flechette thrower.
It turned out to be a sonic blaster, and Aurine had just been prescient enough to drag herself and her Padawan out of its range. Sascha was still curled into a defensive ball, and one quick glance told her that he was still totally out of it. Conscious but only vaguely aware of the world around him.
As she muttered a silent apology to her Padawan, she continued to hold the scruff of his robe and leapt towards Tiplee and Nara, carrying Sascha behind her like a sack of vegetables. She made it there in a single bound and not so gently laid Sascha next to Nara. Then it was time to turn and deflect blaster bolts as she joined Tiplee in defending their defenseless Padawans.
Out of the corner of her eye, Aurine saw Coren preparing to use his sonic blaster again. How many charges does that thing have? Aurine wondered. Most Sonic blasters could only be used four or five times before it needed to be recharged, which was why they had never become a practical weapon. But Tiplee was prepared with a counter, hitting Coren with a small Force push that knocked Coren's arm off of it's intended target. Instead of blasting the Jedi, Coren leveled a small tree in the distance with his sonic blast.
"Tiplee, go! I'll defend the Padawans," she shouted to her friend. Simple battle calculus. Tiplee was the better fighter, and was probably fresher than she was, judging by how effortlessly the Rishati had sprinted to her Padawan's defence. And if they let the Mandalorians surround them both and fire away with all their weapons, they were going to be in for a bad time. Thus it was time for Tiplee to attack.
The Rishati didn't need much encouragement as she bent her knees and then launched herself at the closest Mandalorian closing the distance between them with alarming rapidity. The Mandalorian, his armor made up of panels of red and gold, tried to use his jetpack to escape the incoming Jedi. But Tiplee was ready for that, and as the jetpack took the Mandalorian off the ground, Tiplee too took flight, jumping into the air and meeting the surprised Mando in the air. The Mandalorian fired his weapon wildly and missed. Tiplee did not.
But Aurine couldn't pay attention to her compatriot for very long because she had a couple of very angry looking Mandalorians bearing down on her. The first, whom she immediately dubbed 'Greeny' for the green and black colour scheme of his armor, tried to take a shot at Nara, who was of course still laying prone on the ground. Aurine went to one knee to deflect the blast away from the Togruta and then spun to deflect another laser bolt that had been headed towards Sascha.
"Fight me, not the young ones," Aurine growled loudly.
"No thanks, Jedi filth," said Greeny, as his partner in crime, who Aurine classified as 'Orangy' for his orange and brown plated armor, started flanking her by circling to her left.
That was bad. In a normal fight, she could have just chosen to rush one of the two Mandalorians and hopefully had success that way. But she was rooted to this particular position because Sascha and Nara had were right behind her and they needed to be protected. Gotta make my defence work as my offence, she thought.
The two Mandalorians opened fire at her, firing from two very widely different angles. Aurine whirled her blue blade around to parry the incoming bolts. Her body was tired, but with her mind completely focused on the task, she was able to fight through her fatigue. The awkward thing in this battle was that she was completely rooted in place, and she had to parry blaster bolts that would obvious miss her, but may have ended up hitting the two Padawans.
Then, her opportunity came when one of 'Greeny's' shots came towards her. Without consciously thinking about it, Aurine angled her blade across her body and directed it towards 'Orangy.' The redirected shot caught the unaware Mandalorian right in the kneecap and sent him down with a shout of shock and pain. The Mandalorian curled into a defensive position, massaging his wounded knee.
This was the moment that she needed. She concentrated and unleashed a Force push towards 'Greeny.' It connected, though with much less power behind it than she had anticipated. But it was enough to knock him off his feet, which was all she had been intending to do. With 'Orangy' down, Aurine leapt high into the air and towards 'Greeny' as he tried to recover. The Mandalorian managed to roll out of the way of her downward strike, but as Aurine landed, she simply swing her lightsaber around in an arc. This time, there was nowhere for 'Greeny' to go.
Her lightsaber extinguished his life.
By the time she had managed that feat, 'Greeny' was reaching for his blaster and trying to aim it at the Padawans.
Aurine realized that she had little time, so she did something desperate – she threw her lightsaber at him.
Her blue-bladed lightsaber tumbled end over end and for a moment she thought that she had missed her target and would have to watch the Manadlorian blast either Nara or Sascha to their deaths. But her aim was true and her lightsaber sheared though the Mandalorian's right arm, and then part of his torso. The Jedi Knight recalled her lightsaber to her hand and marched over to the fallen Mando and promptly (and mercifully) ended the wounded warrior's life.
That last effort seemed to drain the remaining adrenaline from her body and she sank to one knee. This area of the battlefield was quiet. But that wasn't right...Aurine looked around. There was a fourth Mandalorian on the ground that featured a lightsaber wound right through his heart. But where was Tiplee? Where was Coren Vox?
Where in the Force had they gone?